


Sleight of Hand

by Nicer_Things



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: ALso Chris isn't in it THAT much but he still counts as a character, Also they live in the Manchester apartment, And Phil's really angsty all the time WOW, Cause y'know we can't leave him out if we have Pj, Dan was his assistant, Gen, I really like Pj, I've done a lot of magic trick research for this so I hope you appreciate it, It's an AU, Magician AU, Man I get carried away, Or rather he was, PJ is in it for a little bit, Phil's a magician, So yeah, That's fun I guess, he's great, there will probably be angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2019-01-28
Packaged: 2019-03-31 13:05:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 32
Words: 40,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13975749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nicer_Things/pseuds/Nicer_Things
Summary: Phil Lester is a magician. Or rather, he was.After an accident involving one of his more famous tricks and a whirlpool of ridicule from the general public, he forces himself to hang up his top hat for good, alongside his assistant and housemate, Dan.Dan is determined to get the show back on the road, but it isn't going to be easy.





	1. The Ace of Spades

**Author's Note:**

> This is an AU. Clearly.  
> The apartment is the Manchester apartment, and some chapters and scenes may be set in Manchester, too.  
> There may be angst, but I'll try and throw in some humor, too.  
> Who am I kidding? I'm not funny.
> 
> Let's see how this turns out, shall we?
> 
> NB: KEEP YOUR COMMENTS CLEAN PLEASE GUYS OK THANK YOU I APPRECIATE THAT.
> 
> -Nicer

           

* * *

            Dan Howell pushed open the front door to his apartment and peered around the darkened, empty entrance hall.

            “Hel _-lo?”_ he called, his eyes drifting across the room to the door on the other side, “Sorry I’m late home: traffic was terrible.”

            “Don’t worry about it,” came a voice from said doorway, and then appeared Dan’s housemate: a young, thin fellow with raven-coloured hair and skin so pale it was almost translucent. He stood with his hands in his jean pockets, and his long jumper sleeves rolled up to his sharp elbows. He wasn’t smiling but he didn’t seem sad or angry, either. Just plain blank.

            “And how’s your day been, Phil?” Dan asked, nicely, as he bent down to take his shoes off.

            “Fine,” Phil replied, blankly.

            His tone was not abnormal.

            “How did the job interview go?”

            “Umm…” Dan mumbled, rubbing the back of his neck, “Not great,” he admitted. This had been his 4th interview in the past 2 months and none of them had gone particularly well so far.

            “You’ll get there one day,” Phil shrugged, seeming indifferent. He probably should have been more concerned, because he was the only person with a job in the house and they were only just managing to scrape by with whatever he earned stacking shelves at TESCO.

            He used to have a better job – he had a great job and it was one that he loved and had always wanted to have, but… something happened before and cut everything short. But that was a story for later.

            Dan slipped into the living room and boiled the kettle. Sensing his housemate lingering behind him, he turned his head from the cupboard and raised an eyebrow.

            “Have you got something you need to tell me?” he asked, suspiciously. He was hoping it was something about the old job. Recently, Dan had been plotting a way to push Phil into going back, but it didn’t seem he was having any of it. Until now.

            Dan waited his response, hoping with all his heart and mind, but then heard a cough and a decisive ‘no’, and all his wishes were shattered. He poured his coffee in silence, left the room, looking to Phil – who had moved to stare out of the balcony doors by this time – as he did and made his way to his room. He didn’t go through the door, though, before taking a quick glance into the bedroom beside it. Everything was a bit messy and unorganised, but that was completely normal. Dan moved on.

            He sat down on his black bed sheets, on his wide bed in his inconveniently small room. There was just about enough room at the foot of the bed to precariously tip-toe along, but maybe it wasn’t all that bad – he could practice his vaulting skills by sliding over the bed instead.

            His subtle dropping of hints to his friend obviously hadn’t gotten him anywhere so far, but that wouldn’t stop him trying. He picked up a pack of cards from the desk near him and tipped them out onto the bed. He was currently trying to master a trick he’d been trying a lot so that he could impress Phil.

            He was getting quite good at card tricks. Of course he was; he had been a magician’s assistant at one point. Yes, an assistant. He always got a good many surprised looks from people when he told them that, because nobody ever expected a young man to be a magician’s _assistant._ Unfortunately, it also didn’t count for much prior work experience, and he was struggling to find himself a good job now, or at least one that he liked. What he had really enjoyed had been going out on stage with a black top hat and a suit and helping out with the tricks alongside the magician.

            As is probably palpable, his housemate had been the magician. And they used to have a stage show.

            They had been meaning to go on a world tour soon; they had a good, supportive following and the morale to keep aiming higher. Everything was looking great for them – two best friends on a journey to entertain people everywhere with banter, jokes and sleight-of-hand.

            Then everything went a little bit wrong.

            It wasn’t much, the actual reason for it all happening wasn’t that big, but it was the humiliation surrounding it that really threw them off-track.

            _“And your card should be…”_ Dan mumbled to himself, “ _The three of hearts.”_

He turned over the mystery card he hadn’t let himself look at and frowned. He was wrong. It was not the three of hearts. It was, in fact, the ace of spades. Somehow he could never get this trick right more than once in a row.

            He put his coffee cup down on his table and got up, collecting the cards with him, to mosey back into the living room to consult with the magician.

            “Hey, Phil?” he started, “Can you teach me how to do this trick? I still can’t get the hang of it.”

            Phil turned to him with his hands still in his pockets, leaning on the wall with his shoulder.

            “Not today, Dan,” he frowned, tiredly, “I’m not in the mood for cards.”  
           

Dan gave an exasperated sigh.

            It hadn’t really been the same since they ended their show and their career, and Phil was probably hit hardest out of them both. No, definitely. He’d pretty much been in this mood since he forced himself to hang up his hat for good.

            Or at least _he_ thought it was for good, but Dan had plans to change that.


	2. In the Bleachers

He should have been able to get this trick right already.

            He’d seen Phil do it so many times on stage.

            Thinking about the show always brought Dan back. It had been a great time and lots of fun…

 

            The lights would be dim, with only a spotlight illuminating himself and his friend. The sounds of the audience’s applause filled the room, Dan straightened his black suit (which had golden flames sewn into the bottoms of the trouser legs) and turned to Phil, who was smiling and had a glimmer in his eyes. A glimmer of happiness. Then the show would start.

            There would be audience participation. Dan would be sent to look for a willing volunteer to be subject to some ‘magic’, and the viewers would always be very enthusiastic about it. He’d pick the most excited person he could and lead them onto the stage.

            _“Hello there! And what’s your name?”_ Phil would ask, nicely, shaking their hand and awaiting their response with a smug smile on his face.

            Dan would produce a pack of cards from nowhere and hand them over, watching the magician shuffle them in his hands for a few seconds.

            _“Pick a card!”_ he’d smirk, _“Any card.”_

            The guest would pick a random card and look at it in secret, then show the rest of the audience before sliding it back at the deck. They’d be prompted to shuffle them themselves and then hand them back. They’d always be in a sort of awe when they watched Phil effortlessly pull their card out of the now completely unorganised pack, and as he showed it to the crowd, they’d all ‘ooo’ and ‘aaa’.

It was always a great feeling seeing that many people watching and being amazed at what was, in reality, a relatively simple trick. A feeling of contentment and happiness, it gave. And both Dan and Phil were content and happy with their show and their career.

 

Dan enjoyed reminiscing about those times, anyway.

He wished they could happen again, but with the way that things were going for him at the moment, that didn’t look as if it was happening any time soon.

Maybe pestering Phil about teaching him this trick he had been trying to figure out for a month wasn’t the way to go. Maybe that wasn’t subtle enough. He pulled out his laptop and opened up Google, tapping his lip in thought. He scoured the Internet for videos of shows that spectators might have filmed, but whenever he put in the name of the show or anything relating to it, all that came up was news articles and parodies.

‘Popular Magician Calls Off World Tour’ was one article he saw. Another was titled ‘Whatever Happened to The Amazing Phil?’

No wonder Phil liked to stay away from anything relating to the show. He’d practically disappeared from the Internet and people were busy theorising about him, wondering where he could have gotten to.

When someone ends a show very abruptly, half way through, and then isn’t seen for a while, it digs a hole for the media and the public to fill with presumptions. And that they did.

After a bit of scrolling, though, Dan eventually encountered a proper video of a show; one without any media bias – just innocent unedited footage. So he watched.

It was strange watching himself on a screen from a blurry camera in a place in the arena, but he sat through it, watching himself look through the people in the bleachers and eventually pick out someone very animated and bring them onto the stage.

Dan was sure he saw a shadow from the corner of his eye, in his doorway, but when he turned there after a few seconds, there was nothing and nobody there, so he went back to staring at his laptop.

The fact of the matter was that getting everything back together was completely possible – both he and Phil had their outfits still and the smaller props – and all it took to get the show back on the road was a bit of motivation. Watching it was very nostalgic and he felt that maybe if he could get Phil to sit down with him and watch, too, it might help a little bit. But he didn’t know how he could convince him to do that, and he didn’t want to get shouted at. That had happened before. At least he knew not to make jokes about it anymore…

He turned his volume up as far as it would go in the hopes that it would travel through to the other room. Perhaps the sound of his own voice would draw Phil from his lonely darkness or wherever he was in his head and into the doorway, from pure curiosity.

Phil was a very curious person. That was what had sparked his interest in magic: he wanted to know what the secrets were and how the tricks were done. What went on behind the scenes? There was only one way to find out.

He’d always wanted to be a magician and the stage show was a dream come true for him. There was nothing that made him happier. At least at the time. People at gatherings and parties knew what he did and would always ask him to do a trick for them, and he would always manage to find any little thing to impress them with, made out of just about anything lying around. One people liked the most was a mind reading illusion done with just a paper napkin. It was very simple but somehow managed to amaze people every time.

Dan had learned that one, at least. Phil had taught him how to do it last year. If only he’d teach him again now instead of edging away from anything to do with the show or his magic and refused to answer to his stage name. Sad, really.

Dan snapped back to reality when he heard footsteps in the hallway. He turned sharply to look through the doorway and made awkward, sudden eye contact with his housemate.

“I’m going to work,” Phil said, in a tone that sounded like a mix between defensive and surprised. He flashed a glance at the laptop screen, but quickly frowned, looked away and slid his shoes on.

“O-OK,” Dan stuttered with a tone of disappointment. He was annoyed that his plan hadn’t worked, and had in fact probably made it worse. He scrambled to his feet and stumbled to the doorway before Phil could even reach for the door handle, holding his arms out for a hug.

Phil shook his head but gave a weak smile – the first today.

“In a bit of a rush,” he said, “See you later,” and he disappeared out of the door.

 

* * *

It was a 15 minute walk to TESCO. Usually one that would be made efficiently and quickly, and especially when Phil was in a hurry, but today was not one of the days where everything went to plan.

The last thing you want when you’re trying to get somewhere quickly is for someone you know to start talking to you, but that was what happened today.

“Phil???” called an excited East Sussex accent.

Phil lifted his head from the pavement and stopped in his tracks, looking for the source of the voice. He knew whose it was.

“PJ?” he started, seeing a familiar face appear, weaving through the pedestrians to get to him.

“Hey!” PJ Ligouri smiled, a very enthusiastic expression on his face, “Fancy running into you here!” he laughed.

“I was thinking the same thing,” Phil replied, surprised. PJ lived in Brighton and he hadn’t mentioned anything about coming up North.

“I’m visiting for a couple of days; I’ll come see you and Dan sometime if that’s OK? Anyway, how’s the best magician on Earth?” PJ asked.

Phil frowned,

“Go ask him,” he replied, stuffing his hands in his pockets, “As for me; I’m in a rush.”

PJ’s face fell, despondently.

“Still not over that, huh?” he sighed.

“No.”

“Well, I… I suppose if you’re in a hurry, I’d better get going.”

“Sorry, yeah, I’m running late again… Dan’s at home, though, if you want to say hello,” Phil explained, turning to walk away, “I’ll see you around.”

“Y-yes. You, too,” PJ nodded, and waved as he walked away, feeling a bit strange about that awkward interaction. He decided he’d question Dan about it. He didn’t expect that he’d be dragged into what he ended up being dragged into.


	3. Supermarket Shelves

            “For… six months?” PJ breathed, raising an eyebrow and leaning his elbows on the table.

            Dan nodded, slowly.

            “I’ve tried talking about it to him, but…” he hummed, “It hasn’t worked yet and I’m starting to lose hope. Only this morning when I asked him to give me a hand with a card trick, he very bluntly refused.”

            PJ looked thoughtful, but then again he always looked thoughtful. He was one of those people who always had a trick up their sleeve, and you could usually tell by the look on their face. PJ was also a very creative person and normally could think of something to make out of just about anything – if there was one person who could sway an ex-stage-magician back into his job, it was PJ Liguori.

            “Any ideas?” Dan asked, his eyes wide, hoping for something – _anything._

“I’m sure we can come up with something,” PJ shrugged, leaning back on the sofa.

            Dan gave a sigh and put down the two cups in his hand onto the coffee table before sitting down and rubbing the back of his neck.

            “I mean, six months of sulking and hissing like a cat at anything related to magic is going to take a while to reverse. The only thing I’ve tried so far is trying to get him to teach me stuff and trying to subtly watch videos of the show and hoping that he’ll see and realise how fun it was. But neither of them worked.”

            PJ’s thoughtful face made a comeback. He put his index finger to his lips in thought and shifted his gaze to rest on the balcony doors.

            “I think I might have a couple of ideas…”           

* * *

Phil Lester adjusted his nametag and stood up straight. He stretched and his back clicked. He had been leaning over to stack the bottom shelves and was now making his way over to rotate all the soup cans to face the same way. It was quiet today and he was enjoying having the aisles mostly empty so he could meander through and mumble to himself about whatever he felt like mumbling about.

            However much it seemed to Dan like he hadn’t taken any notice, it wasn’t true. He’d noticed alright. There was no way, really, to sugar-coat it for him. He didn’t feel like going back, and that was final. There was nothing, in his mind, he thought, that could change his mind: no not-so-subtle videos or trick tutorial requests – nothing at all.

            He frowned as he left the aisle and moseyed off to the home department to make sure everything was in order (sometimes people had a habit of leaving stuff they didn’t want on the shelves, and it was Phil’s job to take it back. Yesterday he’d found a tube of toothpaste next to the candles). The department was empty and so he made himself content by straightening the books as he pondered his predicament.

            However often Dan complained, it wasn’t going to get either of them anywhere. He wished he’d just come and talk to him about it, but being direct didn’t seem to be an option for Daniel Howell.

            _“Not that I’d say yes…”_ Phil murmured to himself.

            He was also thinking about his encounter with PJ earlier. Maybe he could have handled that better… he regretted being so brief and cold about it. Maybe they’d meet again soon and he could make it up to him.

            _“I mean, even if I wanted to, nobody would come to the show any more – not after what’s been going on. I’m a terrible magicia-“_

“Excuse me?”

            As he turned around, Phil was confronted with a short, blonde lady, maybe in her 30s, looking up at him.

            “Can I help you?” Phil asked, as pleasantly as he could over his initial surprise about this woman who had appeared from nowhere.

            “Yes, you don’t happen to have any magic trick sets, do you?” the lady inquired, nicely.

            Phil blinked, slowly, processing this request. His expression was one of confusion.

            “Ma- magic trick sets?” he swallowed, wondering how much of a co-incidence it was that someone so happened to ask about something related to the very subject he had been thinking about.

            “Yes. It’s the school talent show, you see, and my daughter wants to try some tricks.”

            “We might have a set… here, I’ll show you to the toy section…”

            He led the lady along to the aisle where the toys and games were kept and scanned his eyes along the shelves. His days as a magician had trained his eyes to pick up on little things, notice tiny movements, and keep track of bouncy balls under cups, and it was proving to be very useful in helping confused customers find specific objects. He picked out what he was looking for in a matter of seconds.

            “Here’s one,” he smiled, weakly, remembering when he was a kid and used to really want one of these sets. He took it down and handed it to his customer.

            “Oh, thank you very much!” she thanked him, gratefully.

            “It’s pretty easy to make a lot of the things in there,” Phil pointed out, “That’s what I used to do.”

            “I was going to, but she wanted a proper set,” the woman laughed in that laugh that people do when something isn’t actually funny but for some reason they feel like they need to laugh. But then she looked up with a thoughtful expression like she’d only just noticed something very suspicious, “…Do I recognise you from somewhere?”

            Phil took a step back. He didn’t quite know how to respond here. If he said no, he would most likely be lying, but if he said yes then he might be persuaded into giving an autograph and telling the whole story of why he retired. So he settled on neither.

            “I don’t know; do you?” he said instead, trying to sound like he was joking, then he waved and walked away. He scuttled off like a spider to another quiet aisle and held his face in his hands.

            Could that have been any more awkward? Maybe. But it was awkward enough as it was. At least, even if the lady figured out who he was later, it would be too late to talk about it.

            He heaved a sigh and looked up, knowing he should probably get back to work. Every day in this job he dreaded having someone recognise him and he hated it. It hadn’t happened yet, but it had only been a few months since he was employed, and every day was just a new opportunity for people to potentially cross-examine him about his past career.

            He pulled himself together eventually and slunk away to re-arrange bread loaves and help people find bean sprouts or whatever else.

            It wasn’t the most exciting job on the planet, that’s for sure. 


	4. The Needle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A disclaimer:  
> This chapter contains needles. You may have fathomed this already. If you are squeamish about injections and suchlike, you probably won't be terribly fond of this.  
> But if you can bear a bit of needle-y stuff, here you go.

           

* * *

It wasn’t a big thing that happened. It wasn’t serious, it wouldn’t get anyone arrested or fined, it wasn’t a giant tumultuous mess and it never would have been.

            It was what people made of it and how it was dealt with that turned it into what it was now. One thing had a knock-on effect on the next and now it was too late to go back.

            Phil remembered it very clearly.

 

           

The stage lights were low, the darkened auditorium in silence. The room was humid. The glow of the spotlight shone off the studded black ribbon around the bottom of the sideband of the magician’s red top hat. Phil swallowed and flicked his eyes to Dan, who was stood at his left hand.

            It was around the middle of the show and the next trick was one that everyone in the audience would most likely know quite well. Or at least in one form. Magicians usually take a well-known illusion and add their own spin on it and this was one of those.

            “Now, I’m sure most of you have seen the trick where the magician will slide a needle through their arm seemingly without pain,” Phil started as he untied his scarlet bowtie and let it drop to the floor. He also undid one button on his white shirt. There was a wave of movement through the spectators, which Phil could only assume was people nodding.

            “I personally find that a bit over-done,” he continued, thoughtfully, as Dan searched about for something in the prop box at the back of the stage, “I prefer to live life a little more on the edge… If you’ve come to one of our shows before, you’ll know what I’m talking about.”

            Dan appeared back at his side then, and so Phil held out his hand for what he had been waiting for: a large, very sharp needle about 12 inches long. The length of a ruler.

            “Thank you, Daniel,” Phil whispered, taking it delicately in his long, spidery fingers. And then louder, to his audience, “…I don’t think impaling your _arm_ is quite exciting enough, do you? How about through the neck?” he hummed.

            A gasp was perceptible throughout the theatre and Dan gave a brief, knowing smirk before returning to his usual serious expression. He’d seen this trick many times before and it never failed to amuse him seeing the faces of the spectators in the bleachers looking on in wonder as if they’d never seen anything like it in their lives. Dan knew how it was done, too – before the show, the magician would apply a good amount of glue or clear-drying cement to their neck. When it dried, it would be covered with makeup. Phil having a very thin, slender neck helped make it look more natural. When the needle went in, it would only go through the glue but it would look extremely convincing and could be pulled back out again in one swift motion without so much as a flinch from the magician.

            It had always worked very well before and recently Phil had been working on reducing the amount of glue to make it look even better. It was probably his most confident trick and he’d constantly managed to pull it off perfectly. Tonight both he and his assistant were positive he’d do it again.

            So after a bit of preparation to add to the illusion, Phil placed the tip of the spike against the side of his neck. The chill of the metal sent a shiver down his spine and through the backs of his legs and the fine point prickled his pale skin. His heart did a flutter as he shakily started to nudge it through, but his gentle prodding got him nowhere.

            He sharply and impatiently jabbed the needle in harder, and it settled in, making a nice puncture.

            Only, it wasn’t quite where he wanted it.

In fact, it had somehow managed to entirely miss the glue.

Dan watched absent-mindedly, completely unaware of the current predicament. Not even seeing a dribble of blood made anything in his mind click.

 _‘Impressive,’_ he thought to himself, _‘He’s even got fake blood now.’_

He couldn’t have known it wasn’t fake, especially from his friend’s very convincingly painless face.

Of course, it wasn’t really painless. Phil could feel every shake of the needle tickling the nerves under his skin. He managed to ease it through to the other side, though, bearing the stinging, taking his mind to other places to distract from the throbbing. He let his arms fall down to his sides and the auditorium reverberated with applause from supportive fans and viewers who hadn’t noticed anything abnormal at all.

Phil swallowed, but soon wished he hadn’t, and cleared his throat. He didn’t want to take the needle out. That was the last thing he wanted to do. He knew that if he did, his own blood would trickle out of the wound, down into his white collar, and keep going through the rest of the show, embarrassing him terribly.

The people wanted more. Of course they did. Watching people do dangerous tricks was a very exciting thing and naturally the general public wanted him to keep going, but he brushed down his waistcoat and averted his eyes. He stared down to his shoes covered in shiny buckles and studs. The spotlight brought out the metallic decorations and they shimmered slightly in the beam.  

“I know that you’re all enjoying the show…” he started, slightly weakly.

This was when Dan picked up on what was going on. He could tell something was off and signalled to a stagehand to stand by, ready to draw the curtains down.

“…But I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut this one… a bit… short…” Phil concluded, and the curtain began to drop as he apologised one final time and said what would be his last goodbyes.

The drape touched the floor and Dan immediately dragged him off-stage, forcing him to sit on the floor as soon as possible.

“It went wrong, didn’t it?” he breathed, and received a nod in affirmation. He turned his head down the hall and called for a fist aid kit.

“It’s not… that bad…” Phil swallowed, but his eyes looked glazed over and he was very slightly shaking. Dan could see right past his excuses, soon got some parecetemol into him and got him to relax a bit.

“I… I can’t just leave the show like that,” Phil stuttered, looking over Dan’s shoulder, longingly, to the stage, but Dan turned his head back for him and put two fingers over the protrusion on his neck where the needle was pushing his skin out.

“You just stuck a needle through your neck; you’re not going back out there,” he said, gravely, holding him still and gently putting two fingers on the bulb at the end of the spike to try and pull it out, “You’d better be glad you missed your vocal cord.”

Phil said nothing, only whined slightly as Dan slowly edged the needle out of the wound.

“Am I bleeding, Dan?”

“Yes. Yes, you are.”  
 

“Are we… Do we have to go home now?”

“Yes. We do. Just sit there and recover for a second,” Dan told him, putting the needle down and washing his hands with a cleansing wipe. It was cold backstage so he got a blanket and sat next to his friend, wrapping it round both of their shoulders.

“It was a silly thing to do,” he said, quietly, “But we all make mistakes. This doesn’t mean the end of everything. It’s just a little injury,” and he attempted to clean up the wound a bit.

What he didn’t expect was for it to actually be the end of the show. The end of The Amazing Phil. The end of normal, cheery Phil altogether, really. And Phil himself saw it, too.

It was never a big thing. It _was ‘_ just a little injury’. He didn’t hurt a volunteer or accidentally cut his assistant in half, he just made a simple mistake. But it was what he did afterwards that really made it what it was. He disappeared from the magic scene, and from the internet altogether, and forbade Dan from talking about it online, either. People made their theories and made fun of him and with how he ended that last show, he felt he couldn’t go back.

He didn’t want to talk about it or remember it, and he really, really, didn’t want to start up the show again. From the humiliation, mostly, but also partly because he had lost all of his motivation.

And now he stacked shelves at TESCO.


	5. The Filmmaker

             The moment Dan heard the click of the door latch, he was off the sofa, dropping everything and all conversation, and at the doorway. He was always very enthusiastic greeting his housemate back, and usually flicked on the kettle as he made his way into the hall. Today, especially, he was particularly excited.

            “You’re back!” he grinned, making eye contact with Phil, who had only just had time to take his shoes off before being confronted with this eager face.

            “I am.”

            “Did you have a nice day at work?”

            “Same as yesterday.”

            This indifferent answer did not phase Dan’s excitement in the slightest.

            “Come look who’s come to visit us!” he urged, waving his friend through to the living room and forcing him to leave his trainers in the entrance hall.

            As soon as Phil entered through the door, he was met with the sight of PJ sitting nicely on one of the sofas, holding a cup of green tea in his hands and smiling like the cat who got the cream. On the coffee table was a pack of cards, two phones and a red top hat. PJ did not seem at all affected by the awkward encounter they had shared earlier on in the day. Phil, on the other hand, was.

            “Sorry about earlier,” he said, taking off his coat and draping it over the back of one of the dining chairs. He frowned as his eyes met the hat again. _His_ hat.

            “It’s no problem, really,” PJ replied, so cheerily it could have been interpreted as sarcasm. It was not sarcasm. He watched a very weary Phil open the cupboards, take a mug, spoon in about 3 teaspoons of coffee, 2 sugars, pour the water and let out a tired huff.

            Dan, meanwhile, made himself busy trying to hide the cards and the hat.

            “I saw,” Phil said, blankly, without even looking to him, stirring some milk into the coffee, “No point moving them now.”

            Dan swallowed and put the things back. He was always surprised whenever Phil spied him moving things out of the corner of his eye, or even when he was facing the opposite direction. The years of deciphering trickery must have given him this… interesting ability.

            “We were just talking about the sho-“ Dan started, but was cut off.

            “I figured,” Phil retorted, flashing him a look of annoyance. Then he picked up his cup, leaned back on the kitchen counters and turned to address PJ, “…How are you, then?” he enquired.

            “I’m very well, thank you,” PJ replied, observing him carefully, “You?”

            “Fine.”

            Phil had been hoping to come home to something calm and free of any mention of magic. Alas, he was greeted with the opposite. He wished that Dan would just let go of his silly fantasies already: it had been _half a year._ He wanted to say something about it, he really did, but he felt like he couldn’t with a guest around.

            “What have you been getting up to these days?” he asked instead, trying to shift the subject away from himself.

            “Ah, you know, just the usual,” PJ hummed, thoughtfully, “Drawing, film-making, playing the guitar… all that stuff.”

            Of course. PJ was a film-maker. He was busy doing important things with his life, exploring the deepest depths of his imagination and somehow transferring it perfectly to a screen to share with whoever was willing to watch. He had a good following, too. He made most of his films for YouTube and even had a series called Oscar’s Hotel for Fantastical Creatures that both Phil and Dan had cameoed in for an episode as voice actors. That was years ago now, though, and the series had ended since then. PJ focused on keeping his viewers and himself happy, and he did it very well.

            In fact, Phil was almost envious of him. He’d forgotten what it felt like to be appreciated. Dan certainly didn’t appreciate him – or at least it didn’t feel like it.

            “Must be fun,” he said, “I’ve been occupying myself rotating cans of bean sprouts.”

            “Don’t fancy going into the entertainment business then?” PJ put in, as nicely and subtly as he could.

            “I’d rather not talk about it,” Phil replied. This was probably the politest reply he’d ever given is response to a question like this.

            “That’s fine,” PJ assured him, then turned his attention to Dan, “You not going to talk to your best friend, Daniel?”

            Dan was sure he heard Phil scoff quietly as the words ‘best friend’ were spoken and his heart dropped. He swallowed, slowly, racking his brains for a subject to talk about, but however hard he tried, he couldn’t think of one that didn’t involve the show.

            “Look, this is why you two aren’t getting along,” PJ sighed, exasperated, “If you can’t think of anything other than the show to talk about, you’re never going to come to any sort of agreement, are you? You need to find something else to socialise over.”  
           

            “Since when did you become a therapist, Peej?” Phil retorted, but only to disguise the fact that he agreed wholeheartedly and was mildly surprised at the accuracy of his comment.

            “I’m just trying to help you two; you’re clearly not getting along,” PJ told him, patiently. They both held eye contact for a considerable length of time before Phil eventually broke away.

            “You’ll be here a while,” he observed, taking a long sip of coffee and burning the inside of his mouth. He glanced at Dan, who was stood in the corner, looking a bit sorry for himself, “…I’m going to go and get dressed, you two can have your meaningful discussion without me.”

            And with that, he left the room.

            “ _See?”_ Dan hissed, “He’s edging around it. He’s being all stubborn-”

            “He’s watching you, Dan,” PJ informed him, nodding to the doorway where Phil was still stationed, squinting at them with a tangible air of distaste, only his left side leaning in view of the room.

            “I hear you,” he said, and disappeared like a shadow into his bedroom.

            Dan watched him go with a slight feeling of humiliation and folded his arms.

            _“How does he do that?”_

“He’s a magician, isn’t he?” PJ shrugged.

 

            The subtle hints that Dan was clearly trying were never going to work. How hard would it be just to say ‘hello, my friend and housemate who has to live with me day in and day out. I think we should have a civil conversation about the deep-rooted trauma you have been through and try and fix something up to make ourselves feel better’? But no – instead he left hats on tables and asked for help with card tricks.

            _“Either tell me straight or leave me alone about it,”_ Phil muttered to himself, sitting down on the edge of his bed and looking around his room to see what else could have been disturbed. He could still hear Dan and PJ talking in the other room, but he blanked it out, preferring not to listen to people discussing him.

            He took a long sip of coffee, pushed his glasses up his nose and heaved a sigh. It would only be a matter of time before he eventually had to admit that he’d never live his little mistake down and that Dan would never stop bothering him about it.

            It was only because Howell couldn’t get a job, he reckoned. Being an assistant was easy work that paid well and got him out on stage. Now that he couldn’t even get a job because he wanted something that he enjoyed doing and those said things need qualifications and past employer’s recommendations.

            Phil wasn’t about to throw himself into a career he hated the thought of just to give his housemate something to do.

            Besides, nobody liked him anymore. He was a joke. Who would come to the show of a magician like him?


	6. Serviettes

            Dan wasn’t the only one who recognised the drastic change in his friend’s demeanour since the needle incident. PJ knew it, too.

            PJ had been friends with him even longer than Dan had. Dan had only been introduced when Phil was looking for an assistant and PJ recommended him.

            Both Howell and Liguori remembered how their friend had been before he’d humiliated himself in front of his audience. Whenever they went out for a meal or to any sort of gathering, Phil was always the energetic, animated, outgoing one – he’d entertain people with his tricks and illusions, the kids loved him and he usually kept a stash of lollipops and sweets in his bag or stuffed some gum in his pockets to ‘magically’ produce for the children. And it wasn’t just the kids who loved him; he’d get a very warm reception from anyone who knew him, and he’d always gladly return the hugs and kisses he was given from family and friends with a content smile and a little glow to him. He was brimming with verve, bubbling over with happiness, the life of the party, really. It was a real contrast to how he was now.

            PJ remembered a day when he, Phil and Dan had all gone out for a drink to celebrate a successful first stage show…

 

           They were seated at their sticky table in the pub with their phones on the table, talking between themselves about how well the show went, when a young fellow approached them, warily.

“Hello?” Phil started with a smile, “Can I help you?”

“Are you… if you don’t mind me asking… aren’t you that magician?” the young man asked.

Phil nodded. The show had been only yesterday but there had been a good buildup to it and there were advertisements scattered in the newspapers and magazines and around Manchester on little flyers. Even someone with no interest in magic would have seen his or Dan’s face at some point.

“Oh, man, I’m so happy to have met you! I really wanted to go to the show yesterday but I had to work…” the guy explained, shaking PJ, Dan and Phil’s hands, “My name’s Chris, by the way. It’s been great to meet you guys.”

“Oh- before you go!” Dan began, seeing Chris turn away, “Seeing as you missed the show, Phil can show you a trick now if you like.”

“Can you???” Chris gawped, looking expectantly at the magician.

“Of course,” Phil nodded, “How about a good old mind read?” he suggested, digging around in his pocket for a pen whilst Dan unfolded a serviette.

PJ looked on, eagerly. He never tired of seeing people’s first reactions to this one.

“Here, write whatever word you want on this tissue,” Phil said, closing his eyes, “Don’t tell me what it is, but you can show Dan or PJ.”

Chris scribbled something on the serviette and presented it to Dan and PJ. It said ‘glass’ on it in big black letters.

“Hand it back, then, face down on my hands,” Phil requested, opening his hands. He opened his eyes once he had the paper, “Thanks.”

PJ watched Phil curiously look at the blank side of the paper, leaning on his elbows and holding the tissue over his phone on the table before scrunching it up into a ball to ‘make it more difficult’.

“I’m guessing something… you can put liquids in…” he hummed.

Chris appeared slightly amazed like he’d never seen anything like it.

“It’s clear, isn’t it? Is it a glass?” Phil guessed.

Chris nodded, astounded.

Dan smirked and flashed PJ a glance. Liguori returned the smile. There was nothing better than watching people’s reactions to Phil’s sleight of hand. They remembered how they had felt the first time, too.

PJ been subject to Phil’s early work when they first made friends. Back then it was simple card tricks and levitating handkerchiefs. He’d progressed a lot since then and PJ would always give him lots of encouragement.

A few years later, when Phil started street performing and was looking for an assistant, PJ had introduced him to Dan and the two instantly clicked. They shared a sense of humour and pretty much immediately warmed to each other, and when they saved up enough after lots of party performances, they bought the flat together. They were probably the closest two best friends you’d ever see in your life: they were seldom seen apart, they hardly ever disagreed and they kept each other company. That was before the last show, though.

 

          Now, sitting on their sofa, PJ observed how much those two loving friends had fallen apart. It was shattering, really, he thought as he sipped his tea. Neither Dan nor Phil had hardly spoken a word to each other since Phil came through the door, whereas a year ago they would have greeted one other with hugs and chatted until they had coffee and were watching TV on the sofa. Today, Dan wouldn’t wrap Phil in a blanket and sit down with him and ask him about his day, and Phil wouldn’t tell him about it anyway.

“Do you talk like you used to?” PJ asked, gently and quietly.

Dan stared across to him with an expression on his face like he was surprised at this question.

“No…” he replied.

“I didn’t think so. When was the last time you had a proper conversation that wasn’t about the whole magician thing.”

“I… can’t remember.”

“You need to both sit down and have a chat sometime. A friendly talk, like,” PJ suggested, thoughtfully, “You used to be so close. You probably need to get that back before addressing your issues. I can’t tell you what to do – it’s your friendship – but that’s my two small coins.”

Dan rubbed his eyes and sighed.

“You OK, Dan?” PJ asked, kindly, reaching over and putting a hand on his shoulder.

“Yeah,” Dan nodded, “I’m fine.”

PJ could tell that Howell was not as fine as he said. He stood up, taking the empty mug on the table and offering to do the washing up.

“You know, just because stuff like this happens, doesn’t mean you have to fall apart,” he put in.

“I know, I know,” Dan answered, shaking his head, “It’s my fault, really-“  
            “It’s not. And it’s not his fault, either,” PJ told him, “Perhaps you should try talking to him straight about it after you mend your friendship again. No point being all vague about it,” he said, drying his hands.

Dan stood up and stretched, tiredly. It had been a strange day today, but at least he had gotten to talk to one of his friends, and gotten some good advice.

“What if I can’t?” he swallowed, nervously, “What if we don’t piece it back together?”

PJ bit his lip, thoughtfully. He leaned over, picked the top hat from the table, brushed it off and fiddled with it in his hands for a bit.

“Trust me,” he said, placing the hat on Dan’s head, “You will.”


	7. Malbec and Streetlights

It was only after PJ left later that day that Dan got to attempt any of the advice he was given.

            He had drawn the curtains by half past ten in the evening and was currently pouring out two glasses of red wine as his friend sat tensely on the sofa beside him.

            “I think we need to talk,” he said, sitting up straight and handing a wineglass to Phil, who raised an eyebrow, sceptically.

            “About what?”

            “Whatever you want.”

            Phil put on a thoughtful face and Dan watched as his glazed-over eyes scanned the dimly-lit room. The smell of red berry scented candles wafted through the air accompanied by the tang of malbec. The thick silence stayed present unnaturally long, only occasionally broken by the sound of swallowing.

            _“Oh, what is there to talk about?”_ Phil rasped, frowning. He leaned his elbow on the arm of the chair and crossed his legs.

            Dan blinked once, slowly, and listened to the traffic grumbling past outside. He traced the outline of Phil’s long fingers curled around the glass stem with his line of sight whilst he pondered how to respond.

            “There’s lots of things,” he said at last, “If you think about it.”

            “Listen, Dan,” Phil shot back, “I know you just want to talk about the show. You want to talk about me and us and what I’m doing wasting my life away sitting about doing supposedly nothing-“

            “N- No, I-“

            “Well, I’ll tell you, seeing as you’re taking too long to.”

            Dan swallowed, nervously. His plan of a relaxing evening in and a friendly chat had gone straight out the window. He was slightly uneasy about this sudden change in atmosphere – clearly today had been a long day for Phil, too – but let his friend continue.

            Phil turned away, sharply, and averted his eyes to the floor.

            “The truth is, I’m just…” he sighed, “I’m… _Ach_ – I’m just… scared… Okay?” he retorted, “Nobody cares about me anymore, even the jokes have gotten irrelevant by now. It’s too late for me to mend it even if I wanted to. Just _think_ about it for a second: I’m neither here nor there anymore, how ridiculous would I look getting back up on stage now? Who would even come if not to throw stuff at me? You clearly aren’t thinking straight otherwise you’d realise that, too.”

            Dan leaned away from him, rather taken-aback _. Scared? Irrelevant? Ridiculous?_ He’d never thought that any of those words could be used to describe Phil, least of all used by Phil himself.

            “I’m sorry…” Dan breathed, putting down his glass and reaching out to put a soft hand on Phil’s gaunt shoulder. It was the first time he’d touched him in a while, but it didn’t last long, as Phil pulled away soon enough.

            “Ah, don’t be,” he frowned, “It’s not your fault, after all.”

            He, too, put down his glass and rested his head in his hand.

            “I’m sure we can think of some way to make things better, though,” Dan assured him, quietly.

            “Don’t you get it?” Phil snapped, “I’m a _joke.”_

Dan watched the candlelight reflect off his pale eyes and bit his lip. He supposed he could tell where Phil was coming from, but still, he couldn’t help feeling frustrated. Since when did people’s opinions matter more than being happy? He couldn’t say he understood, but he had to sympathise.

            “We can think of something,” he tried to communicate again, “There’s always a way. I know that… you’re finding it difficult right now… but I can assure you that one day we’ll figure it out and that day is pretty soon.”

            Phil didn’t reply, just let his breathing speed up and stared anywhere that wasn’t at Dan, eventually letting his gaze rest on the pack of cards on the coffee table. He dried his eyes and took his glasses off to clean them on the fringe of his shirt. He felt a weight lift from the sofa cushion and he turned his head to look up to Dan, sliding the glasses back on.

            “Come on.”

            “Where?”

            “Outside. Balcony,” Dan replied, holding a hand out, which Phil took, standing up on shaky legs.

            “Why?”

            “You need some air.”

            “I’m fine,” Phil insisted, letting go but still following Dan out of the glass doors out onto the balcony anyway.

            The stars were glimmering in the velvety black sky but most of them were blocked out by the light pollution: city streetlights and the glows flooding out of people’s windows. There was one star up there, however, that he could see – the first and also the biggest and brightest in the sky – he knew this was most likely Jupiter.

            Dan took him around the shoulders and pointed out across the city, past the apartment buildings with their dazzling illuminations, gesturing to the world around them.

            “Listen, most of those people out there… they don’t know who you are. They don’t know what happened,” he said, calmly, “They haven’t seen the jokes and they’ve probably never heard your name in their entire lives. They’ve never seen you instantly produce a rose or read someone’s mind or pull an 8-foot long streamer out of your mouth. So why don’t you put them on a show?”

            And for a second he thought this had worked. His friend was silent as if thinking deeply as he stared out over Manchester, his expression a mix of thoughtful and vacant. Dan really believed he’d gotten to him for a minute before Phil gave a laugh, writhed free of his grip and stepped back.

            “OK, you enjoy being cold out here, then,” he said, “I’m going back inside where it’s warm.”

            And that was the last that Dan saw of him that night.


	8. The One With the Phone Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been a while since I updated this.   
> I've had some ideas swimming around but I didn't know which order to put them in on paper. Think I've figured it out now though so we're all good for now.   
> Anyway, I hope you're doing well and you won't mind the length of this chapter here.   
> Toodle pip,  
> -NICER

            Pj Liguori sat at home in front of the fire, warming his hands as he stared down to the phone screen on the carpet in front of him. As much as he was happy to be home, he couldn’t stop thinking back to his visit to his friends.

            He flicked to the next photo on his camera roll – one from back in 2016, of himself, Dan, Phil and a couple of their friends, all stood outside the Palace Theatre the night before a show. If Pj remembered correctly, it was the first big show they’d ever done. He’d be helping out backstage that show with the props with the other stagehands and he had been pretty excited about it.

            It was a great show – he even got to come out on stage sometimes to help there, too, and got a good cheer from the crowd whenever he did – and everybody enjoyed it. They were all completely dead-beat by the end of the day but it was, according to Phil, the best show he’d ever done. It was even better than the one in London where there were over 60,000 people in attendance: by far the most successful one ever. The second most successful show was, ironically, the latest one. Maybe that was why the fact that it had to be cut short was even more scarring.

            Pj heaved a sigh and looked up into the flames of the fire. At least it wasn’t a more dangerous illusion that failed. Something like swallowing a sword wrong or stabbing himself all over in an iron maiden would probably be even harder for poor Phil to recover from.

            Then again, if the iron maiden thing had happened, Phil would also be dead. So there was that, too.

            It had been 2 days, Dan still hadn’t called like he said he would and Pj was starting to get a mix of curious and worried. He was about to carry on scrolling through his nostalgic pictures and reminiscing before his phone started ringing and he swiped it up.

            “Dan! Hi!” he grinned, even though nobody could see him, “How did it go?”

            “Your ‘Sophisticated Wine Evening’ idea? Yeah, it didn’t work all that well,” Dan replied, “Hi, by the way.”

            “What part of it didn’t work?”

            “The whole ‘getting along’ part, really. About ten minutes in he got really annoyed at me and started talking about irrelevance. That was about where it ended.”

            “So how’s he doing now?” Pj asked, springing to his feet.

            “Well he spent the whole of yesterday re-watching old episodes of _Friends_ and then cried for a whole minute when Joey moved out and now he’s eating a party-sized bag of vegetable crisps, so make of that what you will.”

            “Oh…” Pj mumbled, his face falling. He flicked his nails and made a thoughtful face, “Have you tried Plan C yet?”  
            “What, leaving strategically-placed props around the flat? No, not yet.”

            “Now you say it out loud it doesn’t sound so great, does it?”

            Dan sighed and grumbled something under his breath that wasn’t audible, and Pj heard the familiar sound of shuffling crackling down the phone line.

            “Put the cards down,” he advised, and the shuffling stopped, “Maybe you should just… talk to him. I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?”

            Dan gave a scoff,

            “I could lose my housemate, that’s what,” he retorted.

            “Just your _housemate_?”

            “My… best friend, yeah, whatever.”

            “See, you still want to be friends with him! You just need to try a bit harder, you know what I’m saying? Make a real, proper effort,” Pj told Howell, “Maybe he knows that I’m helping you and he thinks it isn’t from the heart. I reckon you ought to try it without me.”

            There came an awkward, somewhat surprised stutter from the other side of the line as if Dan supposed he were joking.

            “I’m serious,” Pj insisted, in his most serious voice, “I think, deep down, he still wants to get back that bond you had between you, and he’s not going to think that you do, too, if he doesn’t see you actively making a effort. He’s still your best friend, isn’t he?”

            “Well, yes.”

            “There you go, then. Go talk to him: ask him how he feels and what you can do to help, and really properly… _listen_ , OK? Look, I have to go make dinner, but let me know how it goes, yeah?”

            “Yeah,” Dan swallowed, “I will. Thanks, Pj.”

            “No problem. See you later.”

            “See you.”  
              
             And he hung up.

           

           

* * *

            “I think we need to have a bit of a chat.”  
              
            “Chat?”

            “Yeah. Haven’t done that in a while.”

            “Besides last night?”    

            “Well… that was uncomfortable. It’s not going to be like that.”

            Phil turned away with a raise of an eyebrow. He had been peacefully sitting on his bed, reading, before Dan had come in and interrupted. He had a tendency to get aggravated if anybody interrupted him doing anything and was actually somewhat surprised that Dan hadn’t gotten the point that he wanted to be alone yet.

            “Look, listen to me,” Dan pleaded with him, sensing he wasn’t getting the green light straight away, “I’m trying to make an effort, I really am, I’m just not very good at socialising.”

            He gained no positive nor negative response.

            “I feel like we’re drifting and everyone can see it,” he added, and that seemed to catch Phil’s attention.

            “Everyone?” he repeated, as if contemplating the meaning of the word, “Who’s ‘everyone’?”

            Dan moved over to sit on the end of the bed. As he didn’t get pushed away or scowled at, he started talking again.

            “You know,” he said, “Our friends: Pj, Sophie, Louise…”

            “We don’t have that many friends, Dan, and we haven’t talked to most of them in ages. I don’t think anybody but Pj could say we’re ‘drifting’,” Phil replied, sliding his bookmark between the pages and closing the book with a _thwap,_ “What do you think, Daniel?”

            Dan flicked his eyes across his friend’s face, studying his expression like he always used to do to decipher feelings, but right now he couldn’t figure out what this emotion was.

            “I think we are,” he said at last.

            “Why’s that?”

            “I… I think it’s because we don’t speak any more. You don’t tell me what you feel or how your day went or what you did at work that day, and I don’t know how to ask. Maybe that’s something we could work on?”  
            “We’re speaking now, aren’t we?”

            “Not casually.”

            There was a palpable sense of tension and both of them knew it. ‘Go talk to him’ sounded easier over the phone than it was making out to be. A plan beforehand would have been a good idea, but Dan really just wanted to get the conversing over with so that he could say at least he tried. But was he really, truly _trying?_

            A heavy silence fell around the room and the only motion was the constantly broken eye contact and the steady rhythm of the bones of Phil’s lean hands moving up and down as he drummed his fingertips on the book cover – long, spidery fingers that would formerly fan out playing cards in swift motions and shuffle and split decks faster than the audiences eyes could work. And now they were mostly only used for organising food products and clicking the ‘skip intro’ button on _Netflix._

            “What are you reading?” Dan asked after a while of awkward silence.

            “ _’The Woman in White’_ ,” Phil answered.

            “That’s a sort of… gothic, mystery, sensation novel, isn’t it?”

            “One of the first.”

            “You like psychological stuff, don’t you?”

            “I suppose I do.”

            “Is that one of the reasons you became a magician?”

            “Oh, here you go again!” Phil snapped, rolling his eyes, “Don’t you know when to stop? I know you just want a job but getting my old repute back isn’t going to happen. So let it go.”

            Dan leaned back, guardedly,

            “It’s not about the job,” he insisted, “You know you were happy back then. I could tell – everyone could – you had a fan base and-“

            “That was back then, Dan, before I messed up,” Phil said, impatiently, “I brought it on myself, really. It was only a little thing that happened and I could have dealt with it so much better: I should have carried on the show, or gone back on stage and called it an interval, anything.”  
            “Phil, you were bleeding, I couldn’t let you back on stage like that, you know I couldn’t,” Dan told him, “People would notice. Think of the upside to what you did. You’ve created this character of the magician who randomly disappeared in the middle of a performance half a year ago. You could do so much with that! You really could.”

            “Would you stop it now? When I say it’s not going to happen, I mean it’s not going to happen. I’m not a storyteller like Pj,” Phil put in with a sleepy grumble.

            “Do you really want to be stacking shelves for the rest of your life? Is that what you _really_ want?”

            “I- I- well, I…”

            “Is it?”

            “…No…”

            “Then what _do_ you want to do?”

            “I… I don’t know! Alright? I haven’t the foggiest idea. Maybe I’ll become a waiter or a mortician or work in a factory making little plastic spoons. At least then there’s less ways to let people down.”

            Dan looked at him with an air of sympathy and pity. Was that it? Not just shame or embarrassment but guilt that was stopping him pursuing what he loved? Did he feel like he’d let his fans down or his friends or his family down?

            “I’m sorry I brought it up,” Dan whispered, averting his gaze, “I’m still sure we can work through it somehow, but for now… we can leave it,” he breathed, standing up and scratching the back of his neck, “I’m going to go and start dinner, alright?”

            Phil nodded and a glimmer of a smile cracked across his face for a split second before it was lost again. He watched Dan walk to the doorway and turn back as his hand rested on the door trim.

            “Oh, and, Phil?” he started, “…You haven’t let _me_ down.”


	9. October '09

            Dan remembered the first time he met Phil.

            He’d been friends with Pj for a while beforehand and had been searching for a job for a while. He’d expressed an interest in the entertainment industry but he’d been way to shy and anxious to ever pursue any job in music (not even the piano, which he was pretty good at) or anything like that that could get him on a stage.

            Pj seemed interested in everything he was saying and always had a very thoughtful look on his face whenever Dan talked about it. Eventually, one evening, Pj told him he had a friend he’d like him to meet.

            They organised a date and the three of them met up one October afternoon back in 2009. They met at Piccadilly station and Dan remembered it vividly.

            It was chilly and the station was crowded but Dan made his way through the crowd, following Pj close like a shadow. They snaked their way from the platform, through the masses and eventually came to a standstill on the concourse. Through the swathes of busy commuters, Pj pointed out a tall, somewhat scrawny young lad with a black fringe that almost covered half his pale face.

            “That’s him?” Dan asked, thinking this friend looked a bit like a sad emo straight from _MySpace_. Not that he had anything against _MySpace,_ but he couldn’t help but expect a monotone voice and maybe, when they got closer, black eye shadow.

            “That’s him,” Pj nodded, leading Dan forward.

            That was the moment Phil turned to them, and his sharp, bright eyes shot straight through Dan’s soul.

            “Hi, guys!” were the first words out of Pj’s friend’s mouth, and they were spoken in such a cheery manner that Dan was actually mildly taken-aback.

            Pj greeted him with a hug but Dan stood back nervously, wondering how to introduce himself to this potential new friend (who was not wearing eye shadow but was still very pale and had a fringe at least 6 inches long. Dan could not pass judgment on this because his fringe was just as bad so that would be hypocritical). As it turned out, he didn’t need to worry about introducing himself.

            “I’m Phil,” fringe-boy said in a strong Northern accent, holding out a hand.

            “I’m Dan,” Dan replied, shaking his hand. He was a little shorter than Phil at the time and so had to look up slightly to make proper eye contact, but when he did for that first time, he felt that something just clicked into place.

            Phil clearly thought so, too, because he tilted his head to the side and his expression turned thoughtful. He smiled a smile more like a smirk, with only the right side of his mouth turning up, showing a small laugh line, then he let go of Dan’s hand.

            “Phil’s a magician,” Pj said, with an air of pride.

            “Oh!” Phil snickered, looking a bit sheepish, “I don’t know about that…”

            “Like – a proper, actual stage magician?” Dan gawped. He’d never met anybody who had their own stage show before. Phil only laughed, though, and shook his head.

            “No, it’s not a business,” he replied, straightening the strap of his messenger bag, “Not yet, at least. I’m a street performer most of the time. When I’m at parties, people will get me to do a trick or two sometimes. I don’t get paid for it. When I get better at it, I want to start doing kid’s parties.”

            “Kid’s parties?”

            “Yeah – I’d have to get rid of the fringe first, eh? I mean, what kind of parent would hire me looking like a mop’s fallen on my head?”

            Dan had to snigger at that. He liked Phil’s sense of humour and, even though they were a bit shy at first, they both got on well over the course of their day with Pj. They all went for a walk, out for coffee, to the cinema, and all through the day they got to learn more about each-other. Dan was an introverted 18 year old who spent most of his time on the Internet alone, and Phil was an Introverted 22 year old who… spent most of his time on the Internet alone. All in all, they had a lot in common: a taste in music, games, films, a shared sense of humour and a joint love of reading.

           There was something about this Phil guy that was just so… entertaining. He had so much energy – so much get-up-and-go – it seemed to radiate from him. Maybe it transferred to Dan because he always felt that little bit happier around him. He was perky, chipper, bubbly and maybe a little bit jumpy, but sometimes that energy was just what you needed.

           The two got on like a house on fire and were best friends within only a few months. It was only a few years later that they moved in to their flat in Manchester. They got it relatively cheap, which was good because – even though Phil had extended his reach to all sorts of parties and celebrations – being an illusionist wasn’t a very stable career.

           And that’s how it was for a very long time: a bright, sparky Phil, a happy, cheerful Dan. Just two best buds out on an adventure - a mission, if you will, to entertain.

           But what was left of that now? Maybe his confidence had only come from the steady climb up to where he was, and right before he reached his goal, to have a world tour, to travel about doing what he loved and learning about other cultures while he was at it, he messed up. And not even that badly. Maybe he thought people would think bad of him, but that wasn’t true.

           In any case, whatever happened, whatever was going on in his head, when Dan looked at him, he looked back… differently. His eyes weren’t wide and bright anymore, they were glazed over and had rings so dark he could put some little bear ears on and pretend to be a panda. If he still had his sense of humour, that is. The only mildly funny thing he’d done this week was say ‘bubbles’ in a really angry voice.

           Besides reading, he didn’t really do much, and he certainly didn’t have that verve he used to. He’d cook, he was a good cook, so that was something at least, but sulking and watching stuff was pretty much his favourite pastime now. You would have thought that so many sitcoms would give him a bit of comical talent by now, but any one-liners he came up with were dripping with sarcasm.

           Maybe he’d ‘grown out’ of his magician dream. Was that possible? By the tone in his voice when he talked about it, Dan guessed not.

           He’d just liked it better when his housemate used to do tricks with cards instead of building towers out of them.


	10. The One With All the Bikes

“I’ve been thinking and… Well, I don’t think you’ll like it.”

            Dan was seated on the sofa, sprawled out and half watching the credits roll down at the end of whatever film he’d been watching. He perked up from his semi-awake state onto full guard when he heard his housemate’s voice and lifted his head to look up to him.

            “What is it?” he asked, scrambling to his feet and moving over to stand with Phil beside the dining table.

            Phil looked up with tired green eyes to meet his friend’s concerned gaze. He looked tired, it was chilly and he had wrapped himself up in a burgundy cardigan that hadn’t seen the outside of his wardrobe in goodness knows how long. He considered saying ‘never mind’ and getting out of it then, but he had committed to this now and wasn’t about to forget it.

            “I think… I think you ought to go,” he said.

            Dan looked stunned and seemed to go through about 5 emotions in the space of half a minute.

            _“Go?_ ” he repeated, “Where? Why?”

            “I don’t know. Back to your parents, I suppose,” Phil replied, shrugging and turning away, “Listen, I can’t support you anymore. I haven’t got a great job and I can tell you aren’t happy living with me anymore. I don’t want to put you through having to stay, so… if you want to go, I think you should. Your family can make you more comfortable than I can.”

            Dan shook his head.

            “I’m not going anywhere. I don’t know what you’re talking about – I’m not fed up living with you at all; you’re still my friend and you know that. I’m only trying to help you…” he sighed.

            “I know you only want the show back so you can have a job, don’t think I don’t.”

            “What? No, that’s not true!” Dan retorted, a mix of surprised and affronted, “I’m sorry, I should stop being so pushy. It’s your choice what you want to do with your life and I can’t dictate that for you. I respect that, I’m sorry. I’ll find a job, I promise, and I don’t care what job it is as long as you’re happy.”

            There fell silence, and the only noise was the traffic grumbling past outside: beeping and rumbling, going about their ordinary lives. People with places to go and things to see. Dan kind of wished he was one of them.

            “I’m sorry,” he said again, hoping to not get kicked out of the apartment. What he’d said was all completely true, he only hoped it was obvious that it was. Phil seemed to see that, though, and averted his eyes to the floor.

            “Me, too,” he said. He was a bright guy and he always had been – he could tell when people were telling the truth and he wasn’t about to test that any more, “I’m glad you don’t want to leave, but… the option’s there if you change your mind.”

            Dan wasn’t going to change his mind. If anything, the look on his friend’s face throughout the whole exchange told him that he was actually getting somewhere and that they were making progress. He didn’t know where this sudden idea of moving out had come from but he sure hoped it didn’t crop up again.

           

* * *

Phil Lester slipped out of the flat like a shadow that night, making no noise and causing no disturbance, not even as the door creaked open to let him out.

            He didn’t know where he was going exactly but he felt that he needed some time to think in the fresh air.

            Maybe he’d been too harsh – perhaps Dan’s idea was worth a bit of consideration. It was true, he really didn’t want to waste the rest of his life doing something he didn’t care for, but on the other hand he really didn’t want to put both himself and Dan through the humiliation that going back on stage would doubtless bring.

            Wrapping his arms around himself to keep warm as he wandered down the road, Phil remembered how great being up on stage had been. He had made so many people happy and he didn’t feel like he could really do that again any other way. He wasn’t just a magician, he was pretty much a comedian, too. He’d fill the gaps between tricks with jokes and relatable anecdotes and the sounds of the audience’s laughter filling the auditorium forever brought a smile to his face. He hadn’t made somebody laugh in goodness knows how long since then.

            He stuffed his hands in his coat pockets and recalled another instance on-stage;

           

* * *

 

            “You know, people sometimes come up to me and Dan on the streets when they recognise us,” Phil said to his viewers as the stage-hands behind him wheeled out a large prop for the next illusion. Dan stood beside him, proudly, with his hands behind his back.

            “They usually ask for our autographs and all that, but a few of them will ask to see a trick. This next one is one I wish I could do right there and then, but I might get arrested for it…” Phil continued, looking behind him to see how progress was going.

There, in the centre of the stage, was a black Yamaha Warrior 1700: a loud, flashy beast of a motorcycle. You’d hear one of these coming down the road from a mile away. You could go out and buy one, if you could afford it, for over £5,000. If you could also pay your neighbours to not complain about the noise, that is.

“Do any of you here know how much it costs to buy one of these?” Phil asked, looking back up to the auditorium. He received a few nods from a couple of bike enthusiasts and slowly returned this nod, knowingly, “The answer is ‘a lot’,” he added, for those clueless.

Just in case the sceptics in the bleachers were cynical as to whether this was a real, genuine motorbike (which, by the looks on their faces, they were), Phil decided he ought to prove himself.

“Now, I’ll show you that this is a real bike…” he hummed, walking over to the Yamaha and sitting himself down on the leather seat, getting comfy, “Better turn the microphones off – don’t want to deafen you all,” he said, casting a glance to the sound team behind him, concealed by the red curtains. Once he was sure the mic was off, he flicked on the engine. The bike grumbled to life like a big, angry dragon and filled the whole hall with an angry growl. A couple of boisterous revs merited a round of ‘ooo’ from the audience and Phil switched off the Warrior. With a wave of his hand, the microphones were turned back on.

“You won’t have to applaud after this one because I’ve been _completely_ deafened,” he joked, and his viewers chuckled. He looked over to Dan quickly as he stepped off the bike and four stagehands came out from behind the scenes, carrying a large red sheet which they then laid out on the floor. They gave Phil a discreet nod to say they were ready, and the magician cleared his throat.

“But perhaps a big, noisy cruiser isn’t your thing,” he started, putting his hands on his hips and smirking slightly, “Which is why we’ve been working on this trick. In fact, Dan’s the star of this one. Should we start?” and he placed his hat on top of Dan’s head before moving around to stand behind the bike, “Take it away.”

Dan bowed, fixed his suit and gestured for the stagehands to raise the sheet as some tense music picked up. Moving to stand in front of it, he straightened his posture and stared up into the nosebleeds where hundreds of expectant faces looked down at him.

“Better get this right,” he smiled, proudly, “The hat’s a good confidence-booster, I’ll admit.”

His audience laughed as they waited for him to complete the illusion.

With a lot of wavy hand gestures and a focused expression, Dan walked over to the other end of the curtain and held his arms out, pointing his fingertips to the sheet and clicking his fingers, loudly.

With a puff of smoke, a flash of light and a loud noise, the sheet fell.

In place of the Yamaha was a rumbling, bright red Ducati 999r. Posed on his back with one foot over the handlebars, the other on the floor, an elbow on the seat and a rose in his mouth, was our magician.

As the crowd cheered their support, Phil turned his head to smile at Dan, who helped him up off the Ducati and to his feet again before giving back the hat.

As the stagehands came back out and (after being thanked by the magician and his assistant) carefully wheeled away the sports bike, Phil stepped over to the edge of the platform and presented the rose to a blonde lady in the bleachers who he knew.

The motorcycle trick was one of his favourites: it always got the best reactions and getting to rev the Yamaha like a cool biker was always pretty fun, too. The looks and the smiling faces he got whenever he used this illusion were the ones that made the whole job the best he could ask for.

 

A low growling sound was what brought Phil back to reality and threw him back into the real world where he was, in fact, only walking down a pavement. He looked up and to his left just in time to see a bright red Ducati roll past. He decided to lean on a lamp post and people-watch to calm down.

It was then that Phil spied a familiar face, and said face also saw him.

“Chris?”


	11. Chris Gives a Monologue and Then it Rains

            “Phil? Is… is it you?” Chris gawped, as if he doubted Phil’s very existence, “What are you doing out so late? It’s _freezing!”_

Phil and Chris Kendall had met a few times since their run-in at the pub – he came to every show and, at the later shows where they were available, made sure to get V.I.P tickets every time so he could go and say hello after the performance. He was always very friendly and cheerful to meet them, and Dan and Phil remembered him every time. Of course, they hadn’t seen him at the last show because there had been no meet-and-greet session after.

Phil sighed now, hanging his head and stepping forward, his hands still in his pockets.

            “Ah, just thinking… you know?” he replied, nonchalantly. He had to agree it was freezing, though, “You?”

            “I’m staying with a friend because I’m coming over to see a show at the theatre tomorrow – he sent me out to get some snacks from the Co-op while he finds a horror movie to put on or something… Anyway, I didn’t want to go out at first but I’m glad I did now, otherwise I wouldn’t have run into you,” Chris breathed, still in a state of shock, “I’ll tell you the truth, man, I thought you were dead.”

            “D- dead?” Phil repeated, sounding as if he’d forgotten the word and was trying to remember what it meant. He never thought that he’d really caused that much of a worry after he disappeared; he pretty much assumed that his fans (who as a group called themselves the ‘Phandom’) had just moved on from him and gotten on with their lives without a care in the world. After all, it had been over half a year at this point.

            “Well, I didn’t have a reason not to think that you were. A lot of people thought the same. The only kind of assurance we got was when Dan tweeted that you were both OK, but that was only a few days after the last show. He seemed quiet, and after a few months I started to not really fully believe him…” Kendall explained, “But now I know you’re alive and well, at least! Or… I only _think_ you’re well.”

            “I’m fine,” Phil assured him, though even he didn’t sound very convinced, “So is Dan.”    

            Chris looked even less convinced than Phil did. He breathed into his hands to warm them and then wrapped his arms around his torso to try and retain some heat.

            “If you don’t mind me asking,” he started, shivering, “What _did_ happen at that last show?”

            Phil fell silent. He considered telling the whole truth and coming completely clean, but he knew that Chris was part of a lot of the online fan groups trying to figure out where on Earth he had gotten to. It was hardly a good idea to risk word getting around because not everybody was as supportive as the Phandom, and even they weren’t very supportive at times. Phil still didn’t want to lie, though, and so he tried to water down the story as best he could.

            “Something went wrong and I had to go off-stage to sort it out,” he said. This was as diluted as he was willing to go.

            “Why didn’t you go back out?” Chris asked, his expression saddening.

            “I’d rather not say,” Phil replied. He could feel the slight patter of raindrops dripping into his hair and onto his glasses and he started to shiver. Of course he had to get stuck in the rain…

            “So you gave up what you loved instead?”

            “It wasn’t my proudest moment.”

            “You know, you can’t give up on stuff like this. I tried to become a YouTuber once,” Chris told him, “It didn’t go very well and I was always outshined by everyone else. I thought about giving up and kept going in and out of hiatuses but now I’m ready to try again. Of course, having a whole stage show and almost a world tour is a whole lot bigger and more serious than making videos on the Internet, but it’s still the same concept. I found that I liked making the videos, and that even though I got a lot of hate, the majority of people were very supporting and that was what encouraged me. I think you should try again: both you and Dan were happy when you were on-stage and everybody could tell it. I think that’s what made the shows really great.”

            Phil didn’t particularly know how to react to this. It was deeper and more heartening than anything that Dan or Pj had ever said, but he still wasn’t encouraged enough to gather the bravery to get back on the horse again. He really wished that he was, that he could and that he would, but however hard he tried, there still wasn’t that spark he needed, that arrow through the heart, that could get him on track. He did know one thing for sure, though: he wasn’t just trying for himself, he had to consider Dan, too.

            “I know,” he said eventually. This was probably not the response Chris was looking for because he sighed and bit his lip in thought.

            “Look, I’m not going to keep you out in the rain, mate, and I’ve gotta’ get going, but-“ Kendall mumbled, digging out his phone, “…I’ll give you my number for if you ever want to call. I promise I won’t tell anyone anything that you say to me.”

            Phil agreed to this, took his number, added it to his contacts and then said a very tired goodbye. Chris still seemed pretty awake as he made his way down to the Co-op, hurrying along the path, holding his hood over his head to shield from the now pouring rain. Phil watched him go with a strange feeling in his chest. He checked the time – 12:30 – perhaps if he hurried back now Dan would never know he had been out. So he shakily trudged back down the empty pavement in the chilly rain, stepping in puddles that splashed up his legs and occasionally getting a light shower from a passing lorry.

            Why did he come out in the first place? What was the point of that?

            It was a good job he did, and he was thankful for it, because otherwise he would never have seen Chris and then who knows where he could have gotten to. Something compelled him to go back home now, though, and crawl into bed to warm up because it was, as said, freezing out here.

            He was drenched by the time he reached the fountains outside his apartment building. He stared up to the balcony on one of the very top floors. That was his, he knew. Dan would most likely be asleep now or browsing the Internet with his headphones on. In any case, it was probably reasonable to assume that he wouldn’t hear his flatmate coming home.

            It didn’t take Phil long to get up to his front door. The most time was taken up by waiting for the very slow lift. He had considered taking the stairs but there were too many and he was already tired by then, so he took the lift. He arrived still dripping with rain, and even now as he unlocked the door he could hear the wind outside.

            He entered the flat as soundlessly as he could, taking his shoes off and locking the door behind him. He thought he was in the clear until he turned around and saw Dan Howell in the doorway, in pyjamas, looking very worried.

            _“Phil…”_ he breathed, quietly, stumbling forward to hug his friend.

            “ _Hi,”_ Phil swallowed, regretfully. Going out had been a terrible idea. He’d been out over half an hour and probably should have been a bit faster getting back.

            “Where have you _been?_ I’ve been so worried,” Dan stuttered, still not letting go. He sounded genuinely worried, which was understandable, “I- I got up to ask you something and you were just _gone_ , I didn’t know what to do, I looked around the flat, I- I was just about to call…”

            “Sorry, Dan,” Phil replied, repentantly, “I don’t know what took over me, I just thought I needed the air. Oh, I’m sorry… I didn’t think you’d notice.”

            “Not notice..?” Dan stammered, pulling away but keeping his hands on Phil’s shoulders, looking at him with a look of confusion as if he’d just suggested that the Earth was actually rhombus-shaped now, but Phil only shrugged, hanging his head. Dan made a sound that could only be described as an exhausted ‘ohhw…’ and sighed.

            “Oh _man_ : you’re _soaking,_ ” he observed, sympathetically.

            “I ran into Chris Kendall when I was out,” Phil said, ignoring this last comment, “He was very surprised to see me.”

            “Of course he was, he probably thought you were dead. Listen, you can’t just go disappearing like that without warning me, alright? Especially not in weather like this and at a time like this, you’re going to get ill at the least. Just… don’t do that again, OK?”

            “OK,” Phil nodded, forcing a weak smile.

            “Now take it easy a while. You’d better warm up.”

Looking at his friend like this and seeing how truly concerned he had been, Phil felt like something had all of a sudden just… clicked. He wasn’t sure what it was or what had caused it, but it happened and a new set of ideas was beginning to form.

What this meant he did not know, either, but he had a feeling he wouldn’t sleep tonight.


	12. Dan Looks At a Bow-tie and Phil Discovers the Internet is OK Sometimes

Naturally, after all this worrying and walking and thinking deeply, no sleep was to be had that night on Phil’s part. He lay awake staring up at the ceiling until he started to get green squiggles at the backs of his eyes. He wasn’t even thinking about anything – he’d had enough of that and it was getting exhausting now – he only stared.

            Whatever had clicked in his mind was telling him to do something, he just didn’t know what it was yet.

            Rubbing his eyes and rolling over, Phil heaved a loud sigh. Nothing was ever simple, was it? He slowly removed his hands from over his face and found himself staring right at the laptop on his desk under the window. He remained like this for a while before quietly sliding out of bed and padding over to the desk.

            The laptop was off, but it didn’t take long to power back on again. Phil wished that it could turn on a bit quieter because he was pretty sure Dan was asleep already in the next room. Nevertheless, Phil sat down on the chair and opened up YouTube. Something in his mind was urging him to search something up and there was nothing he could do to stop himself anymore.

            He looked up one of his own shows.

            He knew he had to cave sometime, but he had been dreading the moment he would do this for so long. He was dreading watching himself, watching Dan, looking at the theatre and, most of all, reading the comments. He selected the first video he saw that didn’t have a deprecating title and that wasn’t a conspiracy theory.

            It was filmed from a seat at the top of the nosebleeds and so you could hardly see a thing until about 2 minutes in and the person recording zoomed in onto the stage, the picture sharpening.

            Phil almost cringed at the sight of himself. It always felt weird seeing himself from a camera and he hated it, so he tried to focus on Dan instead.

            Dan helped a lot on stage. He wasn’t like a normal assistant who said nothing, only smiled and waved now and then – Dan bantered with his friend, set up the props, talked the audience through it while Phil prepared himself for whatever the next trick was, and even occasionally did some of the tricks himself, like the one with the motorbikes.

            Phil recognised the illusion they were setting up on stage as he watched the video. It was a pretty common one that he usually brought out around the middle of a performance: under one of four paper bags on a table was a knife. Dan would shuffle these around when Phil had his back turned, so he supposedly wouldn’t know which one was which. Being an interactive show, the audience would be asked which bag they thought the knife was under. It didn’t matter what they called out, both Phil and his assistant knew the answer, but you could feel the tension in the auditorium weighing in the air like a brick.

            _“Which one, guys?”_ Phil heard himself ask, putting his hands on his hips and looking expectantly at his viewers. There were mixed opinions, obviously, throughout the place, but Phil ignored all these.

            _“This one?”_ he purred, pointing a finger at the bag to the far right, _“Well, OK, then…”_

He smacked his hand down on the bag, violently, grimacing clearly. A gasp was heard throughout the audience as everyone waited nervously. Phil raised his eyes up to the seats, seeing people’s worried expressions.

            _“Not this time,”_ he said with a sly smile. He straightened his back and pushed his glasses back up his nose. He did the same with one of the others after a lot of thoughtful consideration. When the blade wasn’t hidden under there, either, he took a second to address his spectators.

            _“What’s with the atmosphere in here all of a sudden?”_ he muttered, _“The air’s so heavy you can bite off bits of it and chew it.”_

If anyone in the audience laughed, you couldn’t hear them. They were all too tense to laugh right now.

            _“Well, last one,”_ Dan said, moving to stand beside the magician, _“Which is it going to be?”_

Phil held his hand over the paper bag on his left, his arm shaking slightly.

He stayed like this for a while before raising his hand as if to power up his attack and violently hitting the bag on his right instead. No knife.

            Everyone seemed to breathe a sigh of relief and Phil brushed his hands off on his pinstripe waistcoat.

            _“You doubted me then, didn’t you?”_ he snickered, confidently, and then, to prove that there was, in fact, a real threat, he pulled the last bag out of the way to reveal a very sharp stiletto knife on the table, pointing straight up.

            The audience applauded in support and both Dan and Phil took a bow. It hadn’t been a fuss at all for them: the bag with the blade was marked with a piece of fishing line that only Phil could see. Of course, there was a risk, because mistaking a piece of hair or something for the line was a dangerous mistake to make. Phil had seen plenty of instances of it going wrong which made him wince just thinking about.

            The video didn’t stop there, but went on through a few more performances. Phil decided to take a break from watching and scroll down through the comments instead. This was the bit he had been dreading, but he forced himself to go through with it. To his surprise, the first comment he saw wasn’t that bad:

            _‘Such a shame what happened to these guys. Miss them <3’_

Phil settled down in his chair to read some more…

            _‘I was such a big fan of these two. They were such a talented duo with so much chemistry.’_

_‘Hope we get to see them again one day.’_

_‘Why did the media have to make Dan and Phil into such a joke? They were amazing!’_

And finally,

            _‘I was at this show and it was the most amazing atmosphere. Everyone was so nice, it was the most fun I’ve ever had! Miss these two…’_ followed by a string of tired, pensive, disappointed and crying emojis. This was where Phil stopped reading before he came across anything less encouraging.

            Maybe he _did_ still have fans out there. He’d thought that they would have all given up and disappeared by now, but the one of the comments he read was from only a few weeks ago. Leaning his arms on the table, turning to look down at the floor, Phil saw, lying there where he had tossed it, his old, red top hat. He stared at it as he listened to the sound of his and Dan’s voices from the laptop, though the noises just faded into mumbles as his mind drifted elsewhere. Maybe he was having a change of heart, or maybe just a change of perspective, but whatever it was, he didn’t know what to do with it and it was too late to think any longer.

           

            Dan, meanwhile, was really no better off. Maybe his restlessness was caused by over-thinking, too, but it was more likely caused by a want to make sure his flatmate couldn’t sneak out again: he’d only just finished complaining at him about this time and wasn’t in the mood to do it again.

            In fact, in his impatience, he’d stooped to the point of actually cleaning his room. This probably made the situation worse, in fact, because he had now come across his old bowtie that he used to wear on stage with his black, flame-adorned suit. This was bringing back memories and so he had sat down on his bed and looked at it for about five minutes now. This was not good.

            Having heard definite movement from the next room a bit earlier, Dan brushed himself down and got up off the bed. He’d decided that now was the time to tell Phil exactly what he thought they should do, and end this whole thing where he found himself constantly walking on eggshells. So he swallowed the lump forming in his throat and wandered out into the dark hallway. Turning left, he stared to Phil’s bedroom door. Now was the time. Dan gently pushed open the door.

            Instead of being met with his friend laying awake on the bed, though, he saw him hunched over at his desk with his head on his arms, fast asleep, with only the light of his computer screen to lighten the room.

            Dan gave a soft smile and quietly padded over to make sure he was, in fact, asleep. This was confirmed. Noting the chill in the air, Dan picked up a warm, quilted bedspread and wrapped it around his housemate’s shoulders, assuring that it was tightly enveloped around him before closing the laptop screen without even reading what was on it.

            He supposed their talk would have to wait until daylight.


	13. The One With the Outfit

            Saturday morning was bright and sunny; the birds were chirping, the traffic was happily rolling by outside and the _huge, colossal, ever-seething, churning sphere of deadly smouldering gas, plasma and sulphur floating in the midst of the black abyssal void of space_ , was giving the front room a pretty nice glow.

            Dan was awake already and browsing the Internet on his laptop, settled nicely in-between two of the sofa cushions. A half-empty mug of coffee was placed precariously on the floor by his feet. Any slight movement could and would probably at some point kick this over.

            On any normal day, Dan would probably be combing the net for some quality memes, but today, he was busy reminiscing about the good old days on stage with Phil. Maybe it was too early for that sort of thing, but he couldn’t really help himself. After all, he was planning to have that talk today _– when_ , he didn’t quite know, but it would happen, he was sure of it. He was going to calm down his friend and get him to bury the hatchet once and for all, even if it was the last thing he did.

            His thoughts were interrupted, however, by the sound of somebody clearing their throat. This was hopefully Phil, because otherwise, not only did they have an intruder, but said intruder wasn’t very good at intruding _quietly,_ and therefore terrible at his job.

            “I think we need to talk,” said the disembodied voice, which Dan was now sure belonged to his housemate.

            Dan turned his head to look over his shoulder, expecting an announcement of ‘I’m going out – see you later’ or something like that, but instead he was mildly stunned. His friend stood there, wearing a pinstripe waistcoat, a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, a crimson bowtie and a shiny, red top hat.

            “Phil?” he choked, taken-aback.

            “You wanted to learn that card trick, right?” said Phil, smiling in a sort of wistful, nostalgic way, with maybe even a hint of melancholy.

            When Dan had finally removed his hand from over his mouth, he immediately bolted to his feet ( _very_ narrowly avoiding kicking the mug mentioned earlier), sliding his laptop off his legs and onto the sofa cushion beside him. He welled up as he froze in front of Phil, studying his pale eyes and grinning uncontrollably. He put his hands on his friend’s shoulders and gave a content sigh, still figuring out what to say next.

            “Thank you…” he swallowed eventually, thanking not only Phil, but Chris and Pj and the entire Phandom, who surely had some sort of influence on this moment. He hadn’t expected it to come so soon; wasn’t it only yesterday when Phil had suggested they go their separate ways? What had clicked in his head that had caused this change of heart? Whatever it was, Dan wasn’t bothered. Maybe he was finally getting his best friend back, and if there was one thing he couldn’t complain about, it was that.

            “You know, you were right,” Phil said, shrugging, “I was – we were both – happier back… then. Now I’m not saying this means anything, but… to thank you for all your efforts, I’m going to try to not keep the whole subject taboo anymore.”

            Dan Howell accepted this. Honestly, he couldn’t care less that things might be going slower than he had previously hoped – getting anywhere at this point was progress, and progress was good.

            “Because I don’t think that that was fair on you…” Phil continued, quietly, averting his eyes to his hands, where he began to shuffle the pack of cards he was holding.

            “It wasn’t fair on yourself,” Dan pointed out, kindly, “But we’re working on it, aren’t we?”

            Phil nodded and smiled again.

            “Yeah,” he affirmed, “We are.”

            Dan fixed his hat and returned the smile. The last time he’d seen Phil in this hat was probably at that last show and it felt a bit odd seeing him wear it again.

            “Come on, let’s sit down. I still want to see this trick, remember?” Dan reminded him, and ushered him over to the dining table.

            “A-alright…” Phil chuckled, awkwardly, feeling a bit strange as he sat down opposite Dan. He placed the cards down on the tabletop and cleared his throat again.

            Dan listened, intently. One of his favourite things was the times where he got to sit down and learn a new trick. Phil was a good, patient teacher most of the time, and Dan picked up what he taught him pretty much off the bat. Dan had always been bright and it didn’t take long for him to learn new things. Today was no different.

            “OK, so before you start, you take a note of which card is at the bottom of the pile,” Phil began, presenting the bottom of the deck (the ace of spades), “Do it discreetly otherwise your audience will pick up on it. Always do that before fanning the cards,” and he let Dan fan them, picking a card himself.

            “Right. This is the seven of diamonds. Now you’d tell me to put my card at the _bottom_ of the pile…”

            After he did that, Dan closed the deck.

            “Then?” he pushed, remembering clearly everything he’d heard so far.

            “Then you split the cards about… four times. You could do what I do and get your audience to split it, to make it more convincing. Shuffling is a bit risky because you need to keep the last two together, but you could try it,” Phil replied, watching his student follow his instructions, “Now spread them all out on the table in a line, and the one in front of the ace of spades – or whichever was originally on the bottom – will always be my card.”

            And, sure enough, right on top of the ace, there was the 7 of diamonds.

            Dan held it up with a look of pride and happily showed his teacher, who gave a short snigger,

            “Well done,” Phil breathed.

            They both looked at each other in silence for a while, neither knowing what to say next, until Phil looked away and started to slowly gather together all the cards again.

            “I’m not sure about ever getting the show back,” he said, sounding very apologetic, “I’m sorry.”  
              
            “Hey, it’s OK,” Dan assured him, comfortingly, putting a hand over his and causing him to suddenly stop tidying and instead make eye contact, “We’re getting there, remember? It might not be straight away, it might not be at all, but what matters is that one day it won’t be uncomfortable to talk about, and maybe it’ll be something that makes you happy again. Do you think we can at least do that?”

            Phil smiled,  
             
            “I think we can.”


	14. Dan Buys a Ticket to a Musical he Doesn't Really Want to See

Dan knew that it would happen like this. He knew, sincerely, in the back of his mind, that Phil would one day get used to the fact that he was still a magician, even if not on-stage. He also knew that he would bluntly refuse the idea of starting the stage show again. Dan did not, however, know how to get him to change his mind.

            Any progress was good, obviously, and Howell would support his friend through all his decisions, but he couldn’t suppress that want to get back out there in front of an audience again.

            He thought this as he walked down the streets of Manchester, heading to the Palace Theatre. He wanted to see that building again: it was one of his favourite places to perform and it was also the nearest. He also wanted see what he and Phil had been replaced with since then.

            Staring up to the signage, Dan observed the familiar poster stating that the next act here would be _MAMMA MIA!_. Phil was a bit of an ABBA fan, so perhaps he’d be happy that instead of watching him tonight, the people of Manchester got to watch _MAMMA MIA_!. Dan sighed, exhausted (it had taken him 20 minutes to walk here), and folded his arms. Today was always the day that their show would have been on. The sign would read:

‘ _The Amazing Phil_

and

 _Dan Howell_ Present...'

…with a photo of them underneath, stood with a spotlight shining down on them as they looked into the camera with an air of surprise and worry. The name of the show was underneath: _Sleight of Hand,_ followed by the date, time and location. Maybe they could have come up with something more imaginative, but Sleight of Hand worked, and it was pretty self-explanatory. Dan remembered all the discussions trying to figure out what on Earth they were going to name it, and they started dropping their standards after they came up with such bad ideas as ‘Magic, But Without the Rabbits’ (Phil loved animals and did not like the thought of hiding a bunny in a bag, only to pull it out of a hat and confuse the poor thing. He pulled teddies out instead and gave them to people in the bleachers).

            Dan decided he ought to stop reminiscing. He did not take his own advice. Wanting to see the inside of the building again and sit in the seats where his former audience once sat, Dan did something he thought he’d never do, and bought a ticket to see _MAMMA MIA!._ He did not intend to bring Phil.

           

           

* * *

It had been 2 days since our magician’s change in heart, but even now, as he mopped up a puddle of wine in aisle 19, he was still thinking about it. The look on Dan’s face when he turned up with the hat and the cards was a very rare look: one Phil hadn’t seen since he brought home a cut-price triple-chocolate cake from work five weeks ago. Pure joy.

            It was a while after cleaning the spillage that Phil passed the household aisle. This was where the small selection of toys was kept, too, and along here he saw a little girl around 6, all on her own. She kept looking, longingly, at a very fluffy grey stuffed cat, and then into the palm of her hand.

            Phil thought for a moment and eventually decided to approach the child in the friendliest way he could.

            “Hello!” he smiled in a soft, kind voice, “Can I help you?”

            This girl looked up at him with massive brown eyes and it suddenly became apparent that she was probably quite intimidated by the 6’2” tall, lean, tired-looking young man towering over her. Phil took his hands out of his pockets and crouched down to get to eye level.

            “You want the cat?” he asked, gesturing to the stuffed animal with one of his long fingers.

            The girl nodded.

            “But Mummy only gave me four pounds to spend,” she said, clearly very disappointed.

            It took all of Phil’s willpower not to be immensely saddened and start crying for her. If there was one thing he couldn’t stomach, it was people being disappointed over innocent little things: queuing for ages to buy an ice-cream, only to find out they’d sold out, losing a toy and never getting it back, accidentally letting go of a balloon and watching it float away, not being able to go to the park because it was raining, dropping an ice-cream… generally, ice-cream wasn’t good news.

            “Maybe I can help,” Phil said, managing to pull himself together. He noted that the cat was £4.99 and he bit his lip as he tilted his head to the side, “…What’s this?” he hummed, putting his hand behind the kid’s right ear. He pulled his hand back to produce one pound coin.

            The look on the girl’s face was bright enough to challenge the sun to a shootout at high noon. It was almost as happy as Dan’s on Saturday… but nothing could beat that.

            “There! Now you can take home your new friend!” Phil grinned, taking the toy from the shelf and handing it over.

            “Thank you!!!” the little girl chirruped as if this was the best thing that had ever happened to her.

            Phil stood up before he could be hugged, just in case the child’s mother came round the corner and wondered what was going on.

            “My pleasure,” he said, giving a little wave. He turned around then, stuck his hands back in his pockets and started to walk to end of the aisle. He was surprised with himself…

            The last time he’d made anything appear (whether that be a coin or a sweet) for anyone had been a long time ago… too long. Over half a year, in fact. He used to do it all the time, but after what happened at the last show, he’d lost interest in doing it. Maybe the fact that he’d done it today showed that he was getting somewhere, but maybe it was just his inner despondency telling him he couldn’t just let some kid be sad if he could do something about it.

            Whatever it was, he was rightly proud of himself, and went about, with a glow of contentment that hadn’t been there before, arranging some multi-pack crisp packets.

 

* * *

 

            Dan would say that, over the next few weeks, his housemate’s overall happiness had increased by maybe… 20%. Nevertheless, a lot of their time was spent separately. He didn’t know how much time Phil spent reflecting, and he severely underestimated it. He also had made the very big mistake of assuming that his tolerance to talk about magic meant he also wanted to talk about the show. He did not.

            Dan made the bad decision of talking about the show.

            Phil had snapped at him one night about that very thing, saying how the majority of the Internet hated him and that his little mistake had been made into something massive, and how eventually – if he started the show again – he would be forced to explain what happened, and everybody would laugh and make fun of him. Just like they were already, except this time, even his former fans would have no respect for him. Because, as he said, that was just how the Internet worked.

            Dan knew at this point that there was only one person who could help at this point, and that it was probably time to call.


	15. An Error Occurred

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alrighty - here's a long chapter for you. 
> 
> A bit of a warning: the flashback after the first scene break is a bit grim, I am aware of this. This is what happens when I listen to Clams Casino when I'm writing.   
> All in all, whatever this is, I hope that it's acceptable. 
> 
> Toodles,  
> -NICER

            Louise Pentland was not expecting a call that next morning, Dan Howell was not expecting her to agree to visit so soon, and Phil Lester was not expecting her to show up in his apartment the day after.

            He’d been in the kitchen at the time when he heard the knock at the door, and soon heard Dan talking to somebody whose voice he immediately recognised. He was so surprised he almost spat out the squirty cream he had been comfort eating behind Dan’s back. He quickly tidied himself up to look his best for this surprise visit.

            “Hello,” he said in a very Northern accent when both Dan and Louise stepped into the living room.

            Louise greeted him with a hug and asked how he was, to which he could only reply with ‘average’. Dan excused himself to quickly finish cleaning the bathroom, and Louise took this opportunity to explain the reason for her visit.

            “Has Dan told you why I’m here?” she asked.

            Phil shook his head.

            Louise sighed and took him by the shoulder to lead him to one of the sofas, where they both sat down.

            “He wants to tell you something,” she said, “But he doesn’t think you'll listen to him. He thought maybe you’d listen to me, instead. Now, I understand if you don’t want to hear about it, but maybe give him a chance?"

            “Dan… Dan went to all the trouble of getting you here…" Phil stuttered, putting a hand on his heart, "…Just so you could talk to _me?”_

Louise nodded, watching her friend’s expression shift from confused to touched. They’d known each-other for a pretty long time – maybe just over eight years now – but they didn’t see each-other that much anymore. She, Pj, Dan and Phil had this little supportive friend group, and Louise was definitely the most caring and considerate of them all. Maybe it was because she had children and was used to being a mother, but there was something about her that was very calming.

            “I’ll listen. Go on,” Phil swallowed, slightly nervously.

            “Well, it’s more like a conversation he wanted us to have,” Louise went on, “It’s not that he’s trying to tell you what to do, he says, but he just wants you to consider something. At least think about it. And, to be perfectly honest, I agree with everything he’s said."

            “Go on."  
            "It's about your fear of going back on stage-“  
            “Oh, of course it is!” Phil retorted, folding his arms, “That’s all people _ever_ want to talk about – it’s like I don’t even have a personality anymore…"

            “Calm down; don’t shoot the messenger," Louise hushed him, gesturing for him to lie down on the sofa, which he did, “…It’s more than that. We're not talking about the show, we’re talking about you now. Dan says you won’t talk to him about it. He sounded pretty upset on the phone. He says he doesn’t know how to phrase it, but he's been trying to tell you what he really thinks.”

            “Which is?” Phil pushed, averting his eyes as Louise comfortingly ran her fingers through his hair.

            This was the moment Dan poked his head into the room to see what was going on. He was mildly surprised – he hadn’t expected the conversation to start so fast… Not wanting to ruin it and walk in, he decided to order pizza. That would be a good excuse of why he was gone so long, at least.

            “You need to stop thinking about what other people might think of you. You can’t keep holding back from something you love just because you’re worried what the public might do. You have to do it for yourself, to make yourself happy, and for your fans and your friends,” Dan heard Louise explain, "We’re not telling you what to do with your life, just to think. Think of how many people are on your side, Phil. Me and Dan, Pj and all your fans: we’re all on your side, and we're going to support you whatever you decide to do."

            Phil said nothing, but bit his lip and tensed up, visibly. Louise didn’t know what he was thinking, but she could see his eyes glazing over and she handed him a tissue from the packet in her bag. She left her hands on his and softly rubbed his knuckles.

            “Dan's your best friend, Phil," she said, "And he only wants the best for you. He wants you to be happy, and so do the rest of us, so, whatever it takes, try and cheer up.”

            Ironically, this was the moment Phil started crying. Not violently, but still, there were tears. He hadn’t really thought that the reason Dan kept going on about the whole thing was not because he was fed up, or because he wanted a job, or just to get on his nerves, but never did it occur to Phil that it was because he was his friend. This was how unobservant he was – a quality he should have gained as a magician flying straight out of the window now. Gone.

            “Hey, it’s alright,” Louise hushed him, attempting to give him a hug even though it was a little bit awkward due to him lying down. She let go pretty quickly but he’d calmed down by then anyway.

            “Well, that’s not making me feel any better!” Phil trembled, drying his eyes with his shirt sleeve, “I- I mean, what am I going to tell Dan _now?”_

            “I can’t help you there – whatever you say to him has to come from _you,”_ Louise told him as he sat up to make eye contact. "And whether you want to go back or not is your decision.”

            Phil breathed a heavy sigh and chewed the inside of his mouth in thought. He couldn’t be mad, but he couldn't be happy, either; how had this changed anything?

            “Well… Thank you, anyway,” he said, eventually, with no emotion in his voice that could allude to what he was feeling.

            “You’re welcome,” Louise smiled, kindly, fixing his quiff for him. She’d known him for long enough to know that when something touched him emotionally, he’d do something about it. She very much hoped this was still the case. Seeing the distant look on her friend's face, she decided to leave him alone for a bit and get them both some tea.

            Dan, meanwhile, had finished ordering the pizza and was now having a sudden, unwanted flashback of that last show, and what the aftermath of it all felt like…

           

* * *

_6 months ago, backstage at The Harold Pinter Theatre, London_...

 

“It’s just a little injury..." Dan said to his friend, comfortingly, rubbing his shivery arms and trying in vain to calm him down, but he wouldn’t make eye contact: Phil only stared straight over Dan’s shoulder to the now empty stage.

“No…” Phil trembled, "No, it’s not… can’t you hear them?” he stuttered, referring to the audience, who were still audible and clearly quite annoyed and confused.

“I can, but it’s going to be alright, we’re sending out somebody to give an announcement,” Dan assured him, “You just need to get yourself calmed down, alright?”

Phil didn’t reply, but clearly anything Dan could say was not going to calm him down any time soon. He was shivering through the blanket wrapped around him, he had gone as pale as death – if not paler – hadn’t blinked in a good half a minute and Dan was pretty sure he could _see_ his heartbeat through his stuttered breaths (they clearly pained him from the gashes in his neck, as he'd wince and had thrown up in his mouth from nerves twice already). He made no eye contact, only stared straight on and let the tears from his stinging eyes roll down his cheeks.

“Are you going to be OK now?” Dan asked, shuffling a bit closer beside him and attempting to warm him as various stagehands handed him things like antiseptic cream and plasters (one guy handed a teddy bear in case that could be of any use. It was not).

“I- I-“ Phil stammered, nervously, his hands completely cramped up.

Every time he swallowed it visibly pained him. He wasn't so much injured as he was in a mild state of shock. He had told Dan before the show that he was feeling particularly nervous tonight - it was a pretty imposing theatre and there would be loads in attendance. He’d been acting a bit ‘off' for the whole performance, actually; almost as if he knew something was going to go wrong.

“It- it's over, I- I- can't-“

“Breathe,” Dan hushed him, swiping his hand away from his neck, causing his blood to smear onto his collar. Every time Dan tried to turn him away or avert his eyes from the stage, his friend would bat his hand away, his breathing fast, and emit a rasping whimper from the back of his throat.

"Can we settle down, please?"

“NO! I can't leave it-" Phil half-yelped and half-choked, "I have to go back out-“

This was the third time Dan had had to hold him back and talk him out of it. Seeing how unsettled he’d been getting, he’d gotten him to take a tranquilizer a few minutes ago, and was now just waiting for it to kick in. In the meantime, he tried keeping him calm by taking his gloves off and massaging his hands.

“It’s not that bad,” he hummed, seeing his friend getting gradually sleepier, “Lots of worse things have happened to singers and performers on stage before, and they didn’t give up…"       

But Phil never got to hear him say the last part, because by that time he was completely sedated, had no clue what was going on and was then carried off-stage. He wouldn’t wake up for a good hour, of which Dan spent crying his eyes out.

It really was over. 

* * *

Now, over half a year later, Dan was met with the same face in the hallway of their co-owned flat back in Manchester. Somehow it was odd seeing him awake again.

He swallowed, slipping his phone into his back pocket, and wrung his hands.

“I’m sorry…" he whispered, taking his housemate’s expression as one of disappointment.

Phil shook his head.

“No?” Dan swallowed, “But your eyes are red – you’ve been crying - that's not a good sign... is it? You don’t want to go back to the show... do you?"

Phil gave what could have been interpreted as a somewhat manic grin and his eyes started to water. Holding his arms out to his sides as if saying 'well… this is it…’, he let out an abrupt laugh.

“I want to,” he breathed, "And I _always will_.”

Dan covered his mouth with his hand, gave a choke of a relieved laugh, and let his tears fall, sweeping his friend up into his arms and spinning him in a circle.

_“I can’t believe you…”_ he said through sniffles, _“Phil Lester, you really never fail to surprise me.”_


	16. Louise Remembers the Needle Incident

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, sorry this one's a bit short. It was a decision between having it short or adding another scene and having it really long, and I thought perhaps being short and sweet would be best. 
> 
> What do you think about having some good old platonic fluff in the next chapter? Let me know. 
> 
> Toodlepip,   
> -NICER

            Louise had been there at that last show, too.

            She had been seated in the nosebleeds, looking down onto the stage and smiling, proudly, down at her friends. She had a tub of salted popcorn in one hand and rested her other elbow on the arm of the plush red seat. Her friend, Esther, sat beside her. She had come to the last show and enjoyed it immensely, so Louise had invited her to come to this one with her. Louise hadn’t been to one of Dan and Phil’s shows in quite a while by this point.

            “Now, I’m sure most of you have seen the trick where the magician will slide a needle through their arm seemingly without pain,” said Phil from the stage as he untied his bow-tie, “I personally find that a bit over-done…"

            Louise had seen this trick before: Phil used to do it to weird her out sometimes and she hated it. She almost didn’t want to look for this one but she _did_ want to see Esther's reaction, so she kept her eyes glued to her friend’s face.

            “Is… is he supposed to be bleeding?" Esther asked, leaning over slightly.

            Louise’s face fell. She snapped her line of sight to the stage again to see what was going on. _No, that wasn’t supposed to happen._

            Dan didn’t seem too bothered by the blood – perhaps he thought it was fake - but Louise definitely knew something was wrong.

            Phil usually kept his head up, but right now, he had his chin tilted down so that the rim of his hat hid his face. He seemed tense, his hands were shaking and a bright red drop of fluid fell from his neck and landed on the platform. When he stood up straight again and let go of the needle, as people applauded, Louise made fleeting eye contact with him. He knew.

            The rest of it seemed to go in a blur. As soon as she heard Phil say the words ‘I know you’re all enjoying the show’, Louise got up from her seat, grabbed her coat, excused herself and slipped away, avoiding people’s knees as she went. She hurriedly made her way down the stairs just as the curtain was dropped. It didn’t take her long to get outside and to walk around to the stage door at the back.

            She waited there, the only light being the street lamps overhead and the soft moonlight. It was freezing and Louise had to rub her arms, violently, in order to keep warm. The announcement that the show was finished now had been broadcast just before she got outside, and she had a feeling it couldn't be long until her friends left the building, and she was right.

            It was about 20 minutes later when the stage doors unlocked and creaked open, and out came the stagehands, hair and makeup, people carrying props, and then, in amongst the company, Dan Howell.

            “Dan!” Louise called, and he heard her, quickly weaving out of the crowds to greet her.

            “Louise!” he breathed, clearly glad to see her but still not smiling. He looked worried and his eyes were wide, “What are you doing here?"

            “I knew something was wrong and I thought I should come down to make sure you were all OK. Where's Phil?"

            Dan swallowed, visibly nervous,

            “He’s... he'll be fine," he said, but couldn’t help Louise seeing our hardly-conscious magician draped in a shock blanket, being carried to the tour van by the strongest member of the cast available. He was clearly not fine.

            “Do you want me to come with you?” Louise offered, nicely, putting a gentle hand on Dan's shoulder. She wanted to know exactly what had happened and wanted to help, too, but Dan declined her offer, said that she should get home where it was warm, told her he’d call later and then bid her goodbye. That was the last she saw of him for a while until about a week later when she came to visit to make sure they were both alright. That was the last time she’d seen them, in fact, before this visit today.

 

* * *

          

           

* * *

             It was strange, almost, seeing their faces so awake and being able to have a proper conversation with them again.

            She’d heard their exchange through the wall as she boiled the kettle, and gave a wide smile. She hadn’t expected Phil to make a decision so quickly, but she supposed he was that type of person, and he’d had a lot of time to think about it, after all.

            She let them both have their moment, made them each a drink, put the cups on the table, and waited for them to re-emerge from the hall, which they did, about 5 minutes later.

            “We're going on tour!" Dan declared, proudly, tears still in his eyes. He had his arm wrapped tightly about Phil’s waist and clearly hadn’t let go of him once yet.

            Louise went up to them, wearing a big, happy grin, and squished Dan’s round cheeks,

           “ _That’s so great!"_ she beamed, then squeezed Phil’s chin before ruffling his hair, “Look at you both so cheery! I can’t remember the last time I saw you smile like that… I'm so happy for you!” and she pulled them both into a group hug.

            And the flat fell silent.

            Dan agreed with Louise: he didn’t think he’d been this happy in a long time. He only hoped that Phil wouldn’t change his mind again… though he’d support him whatever the end result turned out to be, so long as he _thought_ about it.

            Phil, meanwhile, was doubting himself. Already. It had only been 10 minutes but he was already having second thoughts. Had he rushed into this too fast? Was it really a good idea?

            Did it really matter? All that mattered to him right now was that his friends were happy, and so he smiled a genuine smile – one with his tongue between his teeth – and leaned into Dan’s shoulder. Surely everything would work out in the end, as long as they kept trying.

            They’ll be fine.

           

           


	17. The One With the Really Deep Conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time for some good old platonic fluff and angst! 
> 
> I came up with most of the lines for this while I was half-asleep so I don't know what it's like really. Just take it.   
> Also. Don't know if you can mention website names in a story. Did it anyway. It's not like it's getting published. Might take it out later, who knows?   
> Right, enjoy.
> 
> -NICER

            It was in the dead of night, after Louise had gone, when Dan left his bedroom, dragging himself away from his covers to escape the restlessness he had been suffering. He crept into the darkened, chilly hall and pondered what to do. The whole flat was silent, as if it was uninhabited. Curiously, Dan gently pushed open his housemate’s bedroom door.

            Looking over to the bed, Dan saw his friend facing away from him, his ribs rising and falling in a steady but still suspiciously fast pace, to say he was supposed to be asleep. Dan raised an eyebrow and wandered over, leaning his hands on the mattress. When he got no sleepy grumble as a greeting, he sat himself down on the duvet.

            _“I know you’re awake,”_ he whispered.

            “So are you," Phil mumbled, defensively.

            “Couldn’t sleep," Dan said, "You?”

            “No…" Phil breathed, still not looking up, though he was wide-awake.

            “Hey, listen, I think we ought to talk,” Dan sighed, putting a hand on his shoulder, “And that means you sitting up properly.”

            Phil reluctantly shuffled up into a sitting position, leaning on the headboard. He took in a deep breath, tilting his head back,

            _“Wot?”_ he frowned.

            “You know what,” Dan retorted, and he was right.

            Phil knitted his brow and looked away, resting his chin on his palm.     

            “I just think it was very… impromptu,” he said, nonchalantly, at last, “I mean, was it really the best idea? On the spur of the moment…"

            “It would make you happy, you know it would,” Dan reasoned, “And I'm very glad you made that decision. But if you want to think things through, I understand. If you’re having second thoughts, that's fine. If you decide to call it off, that's alright with me.”  
            Getting no reply, he continued,

            “I understand this is a huge step for you, but I know you’ll think about it and I know you'll make the right decision, because you always have done.”

            “Always? Like when?” Phil scoffed.

            “Well… at that last show, you decided to cut the show short instead of staying onstage and embarrassing yourself further. You could have lost more blood or dropped unconscious or gotten so nervous that you ended up going something even worse. But you didn’t,” Dan reminded him, "You let me know something was wrong and we ended everything before something else could happen. There were no perfect decisions there, but I really think you made the right choice. Even if it was traumatic for you – for us – it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. If you managed to do that with little to no warning, I’m certain that whatever decision you make regarding going back will be the right one. I trust you.”

            Phil was silent for a bit, staring into the middle-distance in deep thought (either that or he had just seen a moth on the wall). He swallowed and his fingertips twitched as he indecisively wondered what to say to this. Eventually, he gave an exhausted sigh and he limply slumped over so his face was pressed into the covers.

            “It's not that I don't WANT to," he half-shouted, sitting bolt-upright suddenly and looking, wide-eyed, up to the ceiling. He finally turned to Dan, but still didn’t blink, “Sleight of Hand was one of the best things that ever happened to me, don’t think I didn't enjoy it just as much as you did, because I _did._ And it’s not that I've lost interest. I’ve always wanted to be a magician and it pained me to give up that show, but that doesn’t mean I gave up everything. Why do you think I kept the hat? I’ve been meaning to come back, I really have, I just haven’t got the confidence or the sheer determination for that. It's alright for you – you’re not the one who stuck a massive needle through his neck.”

            “I know, bud - I know,” Dan muttered, rubbing his friend's back, not knowing exactly what else to say. He was usually pretty good with words, but he still never knew how to deal with these outbursts he seemed to be constantly confronted with.

            “I found my own sub-Reddit the other day,” Phil continued, quieter and calmer now, shifting his weight about and crossing his arms, “I know I shouldn’t be bothered about what people say about me on the Internet, but… You should have seen what I’ve become, Dan. A joke, that’s what. And if not a joke, all my ‘fans' seem to think I have such a dark, in-depth reason for cutting the show short – something like I lead a double life and was summoned suddenly to do some work for a secret organisation, or that something huge happened off-stage with one of the stagehands, maybe someone got murdered, maybe _I_ got murdered. I wouldn’t want to disappoint everybody with my lame excuse of ‘I hurt my neck’. It'd be embarrassing; I'd get laughed at."

            “Phil, you didn’t just 'hurt' your neck. You could have gone straight through your oesophagus and then you'd be in major trouble. You were in agony, and don't you try telling me you weren’t. Even after we got home. People would understand. Who said they have to know, anyway?”

            “You think I’m not going to be sitting in an interview one day and everyone begs me to tell them what happened? What world are you living in, Dan? The more I build it up, the more disappointed people are going to be when I tell them the truth. And, no, I'm not lying to them, either."

            “I never suggested lying to them,” Dan told him, gently, "But if you feel more comfortable being completely honest, I know you’ll figure something out. I can assure you, though, that you won’t be disappointing anybody. Don't you think that your fans would be more disappointed if you _never_ came back?”

            "Oh, I _know_..." Phil grumbled, clearly exhausted, “... I also found that pretty much every other magician thinks I’m a disgrace, because I clearly messed up and tried covering it. They say I’m selfish. A coward. All that jazz. Not that I’m bothered."

            Dan crossed his legs and smoothed out the wrinkles in the blanket.  

            “Well…” he hummed, with a purr in his voice, “Who do you want to be there for more: everyone who backs you, or everybody who talks behind your back? Don’t you want to prove them wrong? You’re not selfish, you're one of the most generous people I know. You became a magician, not for the fame, but so that you could make other people happy, and I think that’s very respectable.”

            Phil gave a short, sharp laugh, but he was definitely weighing it up. He was sharp, he could figure it out. Wasn't really one to say what he was thinking without a prompt, though.

            Dan carried on,

            "Listen, I’m not telling you what to do. You know how I feel about it, but it’s your life at the end of the day,” he said, “Even if that means me moving out and us going our separate ways like you suggested. If that’s what you really wanted, that's what we'll do."

            _"That's not what I wanted…"_ Phil croaked, shaking suddenly, _"That's never what I wanted…”_

Dan was silent, swallowing the lump in his throat and slowly holding out his arms.

            _“Do you need a hug?”_ he asked, and his friend practically threw himself into his arms, the duvet nearly falling off the side of the bed, and melted like a spoonful of treacle.

            _“I could never make you leave; that’s never been what I wanted and won’t ever be, I promise you,”_ Phil sobbed. He was either very offended or very scared. Maybe both, _“You’ve done so much to help me and the whole situation – you never gave up and I really appreciate that – what kind of a friend would I be if I made you leave?”_

Dan smiled, rubbing his back,

            “Whatever you think is best, that’s what we’ll do,” he promised.

            _“Just… don’t leave, Dan…”_

“I won’t. Don’t you worry about it.”

            Dan started to pull away a bit, but was dragged back into the hug before he could properly let go.

 _“Are you not done?”_ he whispered, and Phil shook his head, so he held on a bit tighter and rested his chin on his friend’s hair. He had a feeling he’d be here a while.

            The whole apartment fell silent and the only sound left was the rumble of traffic, the stifled sound of the building’s other residents outside and two sets of calm, deep breaths, occasionally accompanied by a ruffle of fabric.

            _“Dan,”_ Phil started, decisively, after about 10 minutes, “Do you think Pj would like to design a poster for our new show?”

            Dan smiled, contently, and freely pulled away.

            “Yeah,” he nodded, “I really think he would like that.”

            “I’ll ask him,” Phil told him.

            “Tomorrow – it’s getting late,” Dan said, getting to his feet at last and fixing the duvet, which was a mess.

After pondering the move for a bit, he decided to wrap his housemate up like a thin little burrito, so did just that. He pulled the blanket up by his nose and then crouched down beside the bed. He looked into his friend’s eyes, which were the only part of him showing.

            “You sleep well, a'right?” Dan told him, “You’ve got work tomorrow, remember? Don’t think you’re getting out of that.”

            Phil gave a muffled chuckle,

            “I’ll be alright,” he breathed.

            Dan looked at him for a bit, fondly, before finally standing straight and patting him on the side,

            “Alright. Goodnight, pal.”

            “Goodnight.”

            And he left the room, gently closing the door with a 'click' as he went.        __  
  
            


	18. Phil Feels Very Strongly About Eggs

            Dan remembered clearly what it had been like the night coming home from the last show.

They had been staying at a hotel but, for the sake of keeping Phil calm and not stressing him out any further, the team opted to head back home.

It was a 4 hour drive up to Manchester, but they made it, taking routine stops throughout the night at service stations as they went.

The team had 2 tour vans for their use – one used solely for props and driven by a couple of the stagehands. The other was driven by two other stagehands and seated 6. Dan took a seat right at the back and kept Phil (who somehow managed to stay upright) beside him. He’d considered laying him down but kept safety top priority. Still, he let him lean on his shoulder.

It was almost 6am by the time they got home, but Phil slept through most of it. His waking minutes were spent making sure he was comfortable, but he constantly begged for more sleeping tablets and so these times of consciousness were limited to under 15 minutes.

Dan stayed beside him, occasionally falling asleep himself, but mostly thinking and considering the night behind them, until they got home. He insisted that he would be alright by himself, so took his housemate – who was only just waking up by this time – and gave him a hand up to the flat. Finally, they were alone.

The first priority was getting comfortable and relaxed again after the busy night. The sun would be rising in a few hours but that didn’t stop Dan immediately getting his friend into bed, wrapping him up warm and placing a glass of iced water on the bedside table. Then he sat down on the carpet and waited.

He didn’t know what he was waiting _for_ exactly; maybe some movement or perhaps a conversation. He got neither, however. He eventually had to fetch a surgical mask because his flatmate refused to swallow and Dan wasn’t up to constantly wiping his mouth for him, no matter how much he meant to him, he still needed some sleep.

Dan slept beside the bed, in fact, for a good few hours. Phil hardly moved – probably still traumatized – until the next night.

Dan spent a lot of time browsing the Internet. The theories had already started popping up. It seemed they were trending on the search bar: everybody was talking about it. Naturally, there was already a _Buzzfeed_ article about it. Little did anybody know, it wasn’t as in-depth as they were making it out to be. Most people thought that either Dan or Phil had died, and he couldn’t have that, so, even though Phil had forbidden him from discussing it online yet, he sent out a brief tweet.

            ‘I can assure you all,’ it read, ‘…Thank Phil and I are very much alive and that there is nothing to worry about at this moment.’

 He didn’t respond to any of the replies.

 He and Phil didn’t speak a whole lot after that, or at least not for the first few weeks.

It took a month to get the job at the supermarket. It was a big change from his past career, but Phil adjusted to it pretty quickly, and he seemed to enjoy it. It was relaxing, Dan supposed, opposed to the fuss of a stage show.

They’d been touring Sleight of Hand for just over a year now and the buzz around it was still very palpable. It was a big deal. And now it was gone. Just like that, in the blink of an eye, just for something relatively small.

And maybe now, a whole six months later, they could finally get it back? Dan almost couldn’t believe it. He only hoped that his co-performer could stick to his resolution.

Howell thought about this the evening of the day after their conversation. Phil should be getting home from work soon, so Dan had made the effort to make a good tea for them both: a whole selection of sushi, rice and ramen. He prepared all these whilst squinting at the TV from the other side of the room, on which he was watching _Cowbow Bebop._

Conveniently, just after finishing setting everything out on trays and plates, the front door clicked open. A vibrato, strangled groan came from the hallway, slightly muffled by the closed door to the front room.

“Is- Is everything alright?" Dan called, hurriedly setting everything out on the dining table so that it was perfect.

“It’s the eggs, Dan.”

“The what, mate?"

“The chocolate eggs,” Phil yelped as he violently swung open the door, wide-eyed.

Dan looked him in the eye with a mild air of shock.

“They never scan…" Phil breathed, looking very distressed. Then his eyes fell to the tabletop and his expression changed to surprise, “...What's this?"

“I thought I’d make dinner for us,” Dan proclaimed, proudly, as if this truth was not already apparent, then he hurriedly composed himself, “Th- This is miso soup… and then we have ramen, sushi, rice-balls and little strawberry mochi that I bought from the shop because I kinda’ messed up making them..."

Phil gave a soft chuckle and rubbed his cold arms,

“You didn't have to do that…" he snickered.

“I wanted to show you that I really appreciate you making the decision to get back to doing what you love again,” Dan explained, his cheeks flushing red, “...And because you’re my best friend and I'm really happy that you're happy again."

"Thank you, Dan..." Phil breathed, softly, and Dan could see his jaw begin to tremble slightly.

“Hey now, you don’t have to cry; you did enough of that last night,” he said, putting a hand on his shoulder and ushering him over to sit down on one of the dining chairs.

“I know, I know," Phil sighed, smiling and wiping his eyes, “I just can’t believe we're really going back out there… I'm leaving my job soon, I think. A shame, really - I liked it there," he mumbled, drumming his fingers on the table.

Dan took a seat opposite him,

“You’ll like it even more on stage, though, won't you?" he reminded him, “And your friends and family and fans are going to be there for you every step of the way. I asked PJ about designing the poster.”

“What did he say?"

“He said he'd love to. He seemed very excited. Half of the message was in all-caps and I had to scroll down to read it all. He can’t believe we’re starting the show up again and he’s very, very proud of you. As am I."  
              
Phil grinned,

“Think we can do it, Dan?” he asked.

“I don’t _think_ we can: I _know_ we can,” Dan replied.


	19. Dan is Concerned and Phil Writes a Script

            

            A lot went by very quickly after that one final decision was made to restart Sleight of Hand. There was lots of planning to be done.

            To name a few things: the old team had been re-assembled (they were all ecstatic to get back together), both Phil and Dan had spent a long time getting their design ideas in order, thinking about how to set out the stage and the lighting, rehearsals, touches to the occasional music, and of course sorting out the insurance. Dan had taken it upon himself to find a venue – making sure it was somewhere that they’d performed a few times before so that they were in a comfortable environment - and organise the performance schedule. But maybe Phil had been the busiest of them all. After all, he was the one who had to get his reputation back.

            It was the night of the 16th of July and Phil hadn’t stopped writing the whole day. His eyes were hurting from staring at his laptop screen and he rubbed his eyelids with his fingers, tiredly. It was only 2 weeks until the first performance and he wanted to make sure that he got every bit of the script right.

            “ _Phil?"_ came a soft voice from behind him.

            Surprised at this sudden disturbance, Phil abruptly turned about to see Dan in the doorway, looking a tad concerned.

            “Yes?”

            “What are you _doing,_ sunshine? It's _late,”_ Dan yawned.

            “Writing,” Phil replied.

            Dan's face fell and he gave an sympathetic smile, sucking his lips in that way he did that make him look a bit like a bread loaf.

            _“You need a rest,”_ he whispered, kindly.

            “I know, I know, I just… I want it to be perfect,” Phil muttered, turning back to his computer. His gaunt fingers stroked over the keys again as he contemplated his next line before letting out a pained whine, “I need to figure out how I can get the ambience across, y'know? Needs to be a bit gothic, edgy, shadowy... I need it _perfect..."_ he bleated.

“You need _sleep,”_ Dan corrected him, laying his hands on his shoulders. Taking action after a few seconds, he saved the document and closed the screen, “You can finish that another day. You have over a week yet to tweak it. Don’t stress yourself.”

            Phil gave another whimper and hung his head, his sight resting on the stickers covering his laptop. Two of these stickers were of him and Dan – pixel figures in their Sleight of Hand attire. They’d made these for the Phandom, and had been available on their website (until it closed down) along with posters and T-shirts that the fans had begged them to make.

            Phil wondered how the Phandom would react to their new show.

            “Come on, now," Dan muttered, scooping him up under his arms and pulling him from his desk chair. He ushered him over to his bed and turned the lamp on, “You get some rest, alright? You deserve it,” and he left the room, but not before turning the main light off so that the warm lamplight was the only thing illuminating the room.

            Phil sighed and flopped down over the duvet, staring up at the ceiling. Dan was right: he needed some sleep. He was supposed to be leaving his job tomorrow and he was really trying to put it off – what if the show got cancelled at the last minute? What would he do then? What if he was needed at work and couldn’t leave at all?

            He shook these thoughts from his head, though, trying to stay calm.

Eventually, he grabbed his phone from his bedside table and opened Twitter. It had been a long time since he signed into his old account, but he did anyway. He was immediately bombarded with notifications and messages from fans, friends and news sources trying to get through to him. He ignored all these.

            It took him a while of staring at his profile – with his picture showing him in his top hat and a dark shadow covering half his face, and the all-caps announcement of ‘INACTIVE' that he'd pasted at the bottom of his bio – before he finally decided to send out his first message in almost a year.

            He opened the text box, hovered his finger over his keyboard for a second and then typed out one word: ‘five’. Then he sent it.

            Replacing his phone on the table, he slyly smiled and curled up on the bedsheets. He would see what chaos he had caused tomorrow.

           

* * *

 

            Sure enough, when he awoke the next day, it was evident he’d kicked up a digital storm. All his fans were in a frenzy and he couldn’t possibly count the amount of replies he’d had from everyone wondering what on Earth he could be talking about.

            He couldn’t help but smirk as he saw the articles emerging about it, written by minor news sources and trendy blogs way before the larger companies started reporting it. Theories were popping up already; his fans guessing what the ‘five’ could symbolize.

            “What are you looking so happy for?” Dan asked, appearing beside him and taking a seat on the sofa.          

            Phil only sniggered and tilted his phone to show Dan an article titled ‘The Vanishing Magician Makes a Puzzling Return.’

            “What did you do??” Dan yelped, staring into his pale eyes.

            “Sent out a tweet for the first time in ages,” Phil replied, nonchalantly.

            “Why did you do that?”  
             
            “Felt like it.”  
             
            “A- Alright…” Dan snickered, patting his back before standing up. He’d check out the tweet later, “There's still stuff to do before the show, remember? Why don’t you start packing today?"

            Phil’s face fell suddenly and he swallowed, loudly. He should be alright with the idea by now – it had been over a month since he’d made the decision – but every time he thought about stepping back out on stage again his stomach drifted up to his throat and his heart fell heavy.

            Noticing that he wasn’t speaking, Dan softly walked back over and brushed a stray hair out of his face as he crouched down beside the sofa.

            “Nervous?” he asked, quietly.

            Phil nodded. ‘Nervous' was a massive understatement; he felt as if he’d rather lock himself in a run-down motel with polystyrene ceiling tiles for 48 hours than go put on a show for a crowd who would most likely only laugh at him.

            “Don't worry, I'll be there," Dan assured him, though it didn’t help too much, “I’m sure they'll all love it, and you. Have you finished your script?”

            “Almost,” Phil smiled, wanly, “I just need to tweak some things and then we’re all good to go.”

            “Good,” Dan breathed, getting to his feet again, “I'm proud of you."

            Phil grinned. He hadn’t heard those words in a good while, and it had occurred to him before that he might never hear them again. His heart filled with a sort of warm, fuzzy feeling and his stomach crept down into its place from his throat. Nerves still weighed him down, though, and as soon as Dan turned away, his smile fell.

People’s reactions to his tweet would reveal what the public really thought of him, he was sure. 


	20. Dan Sighs a Lot, Phil Looks in a Mirror

            It was the night before the day of the show and the tension had never been so high.

            Even Dan was getting tense by now, and hadn’t really spent the day thinking about anything else. They had to set off early the next morning to get everything ready at the venue (which was the Palace Theatre, being the place they were most familiar with) and so Dan had done the rare thing of completing his packing the night before. He had finished doing a last check over of his suitcase to make sure he had everything he needed and was now sat on the floor, thinking: he hadn’t seen much of Phil that day and he had decided it was probably a good idea to check in on him.

            Tiredly, Dan picked himself up off the carpet and tripped over to the door. He stepped out into the hallway and, rubbing his eyes, pushed open his friend’s bedroom door.

            To his mild surprise, Phil was not in his room as expected, but his suitcase was left half-packed on the bed. It all looked as if it had been irritably tossed down in exhaustion.

            So Dan stepped out of the room and instead entered the living room, where he was immediately confronted with Phil, who was sitting, back bent, on one of the barstools. He lifted his eyes, tiredly, to look up at Dan and heaved a sigh, swirling the malbec in the glass in his hand. His hat was placed on the breakfast bar, beside the wine bottle.

            “How are you feeling?" Dan asked him, shuffling over and clambering onto the stool beside him.

            Phil shrugged. He’d seemed pretty happy for the last few days but now his mood had dipped quite drastically. Maybe he was just nervous, but whatever it was, Dan wasn’t going to leave Phil to face it on his own.

            “You got everything you need?” he asked.

            “Yeah… I think so."

            “Nervous?"

            “Definitely,” Phil swallowed, his hands shaking, threatening to tip the wine out of the glass.

            Dan steadied his hand for him, holding it steady.

            “Well, you don’t have to be scared, alright?” he whispered, "I'm here."

            Phil turned to him and strained a smile. He was extraordinarily pale, his eyes were glazed-over and he had dark circles around them – he probably hadn’t slept well last night, and would doubtless sleep worse _tonight._

            “Thanks, Dan,” he rasped, his throat dry, and took a sip of wine.

            “What are you nervous about, mostly?" Dan asked, wrapping his legs about the barstool.

            “…What the audience will do,” Phil admitted, looking away, “They might laugh, or heckle or shout questions… how do I react to that? What do I do? Ignore them? Snap back with some witty remark? I just don’t know... I’m scared of something going wrong again and having all this preparation lead up to nothing. I’m scared of anything and everything.”

            Dan stayed silent a while, sympathetically gazing down at him and eventually putting a hand on his shoulder blades. Not knowing what quite to say, he averted his eyes to the hat and thought instead.

            “You're just worried about the people, aren’t you?"

            Phil nodded,

            “They’re what caused this whole thing," he pointed out, slurring his speech slightly, “Everything was hunky dory before that. Can’t- can't keep them happy… yknow? They're - ughhhh - _foiling_ all the _spun!”_

He meant ‘spoiling all the fun'.

            Dan blinked, slowly, and gently eased the glass out of Phil’s grip,

            “…Think you’ve had enough…” he breathed.

            “Yeah…" Phil sighed, hanging his head. Never in his 31 years of life did he think he’d ever be so nervous, especially not of such a inconsequential thing of what people would think of him, and even though he knew he shouldn’t worry, he couldn't control his agitation. He’d thought he could relax and treat himself tonight. He supposed he’d gone to far.

            “I guess I should finish packing…" he murmured, getting to his feet, his knees and ankles cracking as he did. He really wanted to be ready to go the next morning with no warning, trying to keep stress levels at a minimum – not that he wouldn’t be having a _massive_ panic tomorrow morning.

            Before he could leave the room, though, Dan called him and he turned his head from the door to look to him.

            “If it makes you feel any better," Dan shrugged, coolly, gazing in the other direction, “You can just get it over and done with. We’re just going to have to face the music, whatever the outcome – too late to go back now.”

            This did not help Phil at all. His nerves finally got a bit too much for him and he clapped his hands over his mouth as he threw up on his own stomach acid and stumbled out of the room before it could seep through his fingers.

            Dan guessed he should’ve just stayed silent. He also decided to finish the rest of whatever was in the glass, but found the taste a bit sharp for his liking.

 

* * *

 

            They both awoke at 5am the next morning. Dan had been drifting in and out of little naps the whole night, and Phil had had approximately 2 hours of rest and had woken up in a cold sweat. This wasn’t really consequential, as the tired look at the frustrated temper would be good for his character.

            He’d written the script with a little bit of an edgy feel. He had taken Dan’s advice with creating the ‘character’ of a semi-gothic magician who had a bit of a grudge against his audience. A bit dark and mysterious and furtive. Writing this hadn’t been an effort at all, as it ended up being less of a person to act, and rather just a vent for his emotions. Every little thing he could think of, he had written down. He didn’t know exactly how much of the dialogue he would or could use, but that didn’t really matter, as he could most likely make it up as he went along – the most important factor was that he knew what tricks to do and in what order.

            Phil supposed the whole draft would just be a waste of time, and that he’d make it all up as it happened, but it gave him a sense of comfort knowing it was there to fall back on.

            He dragged himself out of bed that morning after grabbing his glasses and briefly checking his phone.

            The ‘five’ he had tweeted 9 days ago was a countdown to when the tickets would be released. They were available so quickly because both Dan and Phil were certain that they’d sell out quick, and they did: within a few days, in fact.

            People online were definitely excited. More theories were appearing; this time about what the show would entail or what mood the magician would be in. Phil had read a few of these, and only one or two of them had been mildly accurate.

            Getting to his feet and stretching out his aching arms, he tried not to think of the day ahead, but there was a painful gnawing in the pit of his stomach that reminded him that he was still terribly nervous. Breathing heavily, he picked up the clothes that he had laid out on the back of his chair the night before. It was still dark but he didn't want to turn a light on in case he forgot to turn it off when he went out and have it bother him the rest of the day. Instead, he got dressed in the darkness, feeling his way around labels to make sure he didn’t put anything on backwards.

            Fixing his hair, he slipped out into the hallway and drifted like a shadow to the bathroom. He could hear Dan shuffling about in his bedroom, probably getting dressed, as he stared at himself in the mirror.

            He shouldn’t be stopping, wasting time looking at his reflection, but it caught his eye as he entered and he couldn’t help but stand and study how rough he looked. He usually tried not to look at his reflection…

            _“Dan has to look at_ this _all day?”_ he breathed to himself. He knew now why his roommate seemed on edge around him: he'd be scared of himself, too, if he were Dan. His whole figure seemed scrawny, and if he had to be perfectly honest with himself, he looked like Edward Scissorhands, only with neater hair.

            “Morning,” he heard, suddenly, in a softly-spoken voice.

            He startled at this and twisted around in a split second, his eyes wide.

            “You OK?” Dan asked, holding out a hand as a sort of surrender. He looked concerned and exhausted, but not as shattered as his friend, “Want breakfast before we have to go? We have almost an hour yet,” he offered.

            Phil swallowed, composing himself, and sheepishly rubbed his arm.

            “No, I'm alright, thanks,” he replied, his voice raucous. In all truthfulness, he didn’t think he could stomach a coffee right now, never mind a whole breakfast.

            He stared at Dan for a bit, and Dan stared back before slowly reaching over to reassuringly squeeze his arm.

            “Hey, everything’s going to be OK,” he told him, gently, “Sorry for what I said last night; I know that made you anxious. Just know that you’re not going alone through this – I’m right here with you.”

            Phil gave a wan smile and his dry eyes started to sting as they brimmed with tears. He pulled himself together and chewed the inside of his mouth in thought.

            _“Thank you, Dan,”_ he whispered.

            Dan said nothing, but his expression was all he really needed. He released his arm and wandered through the door and into the kitchen,

            “Well, I’m going to make a coffee and leave you to get organized. If you want to sit with me, you can,” he said.

            Phil didn’t reply, but finished getting ready in record time, even putting the bags in the hallway, so he could sit with his friend for the 20 minutes before their taxi arrived.

            He slipped into the dark living room, drifting past the dining table, and like a spoonful of syrup, melted down onto the sofa, curling up to keep warm. They hadn’t turned the heating on, either, so the flat was freezing.

            Phil yawned, putting his chin down on the seat cushion and shivering. Dan’s hand fell on his side and stayed there, resting on his shoulder.

            “I’m still nervous,” Phil said, under his breath, as Dan put down his empty cup, and instead of trying to comfort him again, Dan just curled up beside him and heaved a sigh.

           “Me, too,” he said.


	21. Giving the People What They Want

            Dan wasn’t really one to over-analyse every possibility under the sun, instead being the sort of person to take things as they came, but this morning as he sat in the taxi beside his best friend, he couldn’t really help himself.

            What if Phil was right? That people would laugh and jeer? What would they do then – go into hiding again? Dan wasn’t sure he could do that. It would seem like one step forward and a thousand steps back. He’d have to get a job, of course, or move back in with his parents in London. Phil couldn’t support both of them, especially not in the mental state he would surely be in. Dan didn’t even want to think about all the arguments they'd get in.

            He was so distracted by this that he didn’t speak to Phil throughout the whole ride. It wasn’t a long ride, but still it was probably not a good time for them to be left alone with their own separate thoughts, just left to watch the sun rise slowly.

            Phil pulled his hoodie sleeves down over his hands and wrapped his arms around himself, his eyes wide as he stared out of the taxi window. His mannerisms were not unlike those of a small bird: jittery and sudden. He almost jumped out of his skin when the car pulled up outside the Palace Theatre.

            “OK?" Dan asked him, his breath brushing over his ear and making him shudder.

            “Yeah, I’m OK…" Phil nodded, though he wasn’t convinced of himself.

            They both stepped out of the taxi after thanking the driver, and found themselves standing outside the theatre – bags in hand - as the car grumbled away.

            The lights were bright in the dim sunshine and the sign that PJ had designed was hanging up above the entrance canopy – an edgy print of Phil’s red top hat on a black background, with his bowtie untied beside it. The words: ‘Sleight of Hand’ were printed at the top of the poster, and ‘The Big Return’ at the bottom with the date and time. PJ had gone through a lot of designs trying to decide which one was best, but he had settled for shadowy minimalism in the end.

            “Come on, then,” Dan said, decidedly, picking up his bags and walking around the side of the building to the stage door. As he creaked it open and cast a glance behind him, however, he noticed that Phil was not behind him as he thought. He was actually shuddering about 10 feet away, looking panicky and tongue-tied.

            Dan swallowed, closed the door again, put his luggage down and slunk over to him.

            “C’mon, bud, it’s alright," he hushed him, taking the heavy suitcase out of his hand and putting an arm around his svelte waist to gently usher him to the stage door, “Look, all our friends are going to be in there,” he whispered, “Nothing scary, yeah? You coming?”

            Phil nodded, as confidently as he could muster, and helped Dan with their bags as Howell eased open the door…

            They were immediately greeted with the noise of party horns and a round of applause. Phil was austerely taken-aback, and his whole form seemed to recoil like a dying spider. He loosened up again, however, when he saw PJ there in front of him.

            “We’ve been waiting for you two!” PJ smiled with that wide, happy beam he wore, “I’m really glad you decided you wanted to give this whole thing another shot, you know? It’s going to be such a great experience.”

            “I- I- Well, it-…” Phil stuttered, trying to rake together his feelings into a nice leaf-pile of thoughts, but these were quickly scattered when he raised his eyes to see all the props behind the surprise party of stage-hands. All of a sudden it felt as if he was in a void and all the sounds around him blurred into one large drone of noise.

 _“Sorry, he’s a bit distant right now,”_ he ‘heard' Dan say, though his voice was fuzzy, _“He should brighten up in a bit – no coffee this morning."_

Phil skulked over to one of the larger props – the iron maiden. He hadn’t used it before but after the few rehearsals that they'd had, he knew exactly how it would work.

This morning was the first rehearsal in the actual theatre, and so he was a bit tense. This was the first time he’d stepped foot in a theatre since the incident.

            He crept around the maiden, studying it, running his hands over the metal. Easing open the front, he saw all the spikes inside and recoiled at how it felt to be in there. He closed the door again and moved on, his back hunched, like a suspicious cat.

            _"Restless night last night,"_ he heard Dan say from behind him somewhere, though he couldn’t tell exactly where, _“Surprised he’s up at all, actually. Just take it slow with him, he’s still a bit jumpy.”_

Phil slipped around to the next prop – a slightly less scary one – that would also be used in the show: one of those boxes where he could ‘saw’ a volunteer in half. Before he could snoop around it more, though, he felt himself being pulled backwards from under his arms.

            _“Come on, let’s get you woken up,"_ said Dan, under his breath, holding him steady and leading him around to a back room where he knew there was a coffee machine.

            _“When you're a bit more alert, we can get changed and do the costume rehearsal, alright?"_

Phil nodded and sat himself down on one of the armchairs, tucking his legs beside him and letting out a wide yawn. He laid his chin on the arm and watched Dan make the coffee.

            _“Are you nervous, Dan?”_ he asked, innocently. Even his own voice seemed distant.

            _“Of course,"_ Dan nodded, handing him a cup, which he almost dropped, “ _Not as nervous as you, I expect, but I’m definitely not entirely relaxed. You’ll get more comfortable as the day goes on, I'm sure.”_

As soon as Phil took one sip of coffee, the fuzziness started to melt away and he felt himself drifting into the real world again. He adjusted himself on his chair and watched the liquid in the mug swirl as he moved it around.

            “I certainly hope so,” he said.

           

* * *

 

            The rest of the day seemed to pass in a bit of a blur. They went through the last rehearsal, out for dinner at a restaurant nearby, made sure everything on stage was right and getting everyone prepared.

            The next thing Phil knew, he was stood backstage dressed to kill, listening to the pre-show playlist echoing from the hall. He couldn’t tear his eyes from the stage, listening to the sounds of the excited audience all chattering in-amongst each-other before the show started.

            “You’re on in five,” came a voice from the right. Phil ignored it, rubbing his gloved hands together. His heart was pounding so hard he felt as if it might just break his ribs.

            Dan had been watching him for a while and now drifted over to him, turning his head with his palm to face him.

            “Alright?” he asked.

            Phil stared down to the floor and shrugged. He didn’t really know if he was OK or not.

            Seeing tears beginning to form in his eyes, Dan quickly took his hand off his cheek and moved to rub his arms.

            “No, please, don’t start, not before we go out…” he hushed, urgently attempting to pacify him.

            “What if I can’t do it?” Phil snapped, but Dan gently quieted him, gradually easing him into an embrace. He immediately calmed down and relaxed.

            _“You calm down; we can do it,”_ Dan whispered into his shoulder.

            Phil didn’t say anything, but swallowed the lump in his throat. He couldn’t believe that this was all happening, it seemed to have gone so fast. It felt like only yesterday that Dan had tried to communicate with him over a glass of wine - he hadn’t listened then, but he wished he had now. He wished he’d never snapped, or made this massive rift between them. Not listening to people who only wanted to help him was a mistake he had since promised himself he wouldn’t make again.

            Usually he would never be the first person to pull out of a hug – you never know how much somebody might need it – but now he felt that Dan was doing the same for him, so he stayed as long as he could before the words ‘you’re on' were spoken.

            As the dramatic music picked up in the background, both performers smoothed out their clothes, bow-ties adjusted and hat sitting neat, and readied themselves for the big moment…

 

* * *

 

            Louise Pentland was also present today. She’d been fortunate enough to bag a seat with a good view up in the nosebleeds and now, as the playlist ended on Fleetwood Mac’s 'Tusk’, she got comfortable in her seat and waited.

            The music in the background was so bass-y that her seat was almost vibrating, and then PJ spoke over the loudspeaker:

            “Ladies and gentlemen gathered here tonight. It’s the moment you’ve been waiting for... may I present to you... _The Amazing Phil and Daniel Howell!"_

            The spectators clapped their support, loudly, almost deafening, and a massive plume of smoke rose as the curtains were drawn. The music reached its climax with a boom and the smoke cleared, leaving the magician leaning his hands on a black cane and his assistant standing beside him, both with dead-pan expressions, on the podium at the back of the stage.  

            They both walked down the few steps to the applause of the audience and finally came to stand at the front of the stage. Phil leaned both hands on the cane again, straight-backed.

            “So,” Dan swallowed, "What are we doing here, Phil?”

            Phil raised his eyes to the seats and the growl of his voice rumbled over the speakers,

            “Giving the people what they want, Dan."


	22. The One With the First Show, Part 1

           Even though Louise had seen her friends a few times since the last show – the most recent being not very long ago at all – it still felt strange looking at them again.

            As the arena finished applauding for the second time, she stuck her hand in the popcorn tub and squinted her eyes to the stage. She was focusing, mainly, on Phil, who was standing straighter that she'd ever seen him before and still not smiling. It was not outwardly obvious whether the dark patches around his eyes were drawn on or not (they weren’t). He had an air around him that he’d had for a while and that Louise could only describe as manic and uncanny. Dan had one, too, but it was hard to specify: perhaps somewhere between apprehensive and absent. Perhaps his was just for the show, but Phil’s definitely was not.

            Louise made sure to watch them both fastidiously. After the last show, she knew anything could happen. She knew nothing of the atmosphere of the show that Phil had so strived after, but whatever happened, she wouldn’t be surprised. She could almost sense it anyway.    

            “Firstly,” started Phil, bluntly, “I know we’ve been away a while. I know a lot of you here can’t stomach me, but for those who wondered if I was even still alive, here I am. Who wants to see some magic?”

            Another round of applause resounded around the hall but Phil gestured for everybody to calm down. His expression hadn’t changed since he and Dan first appeared, and his voice hadn’t had much change in tone up to this point, but now he raised his chin a bit more and his voice rose to its normal pitch.

            “I wondered what you’d all like to see,” he said, “But I thought we should start with something traditional. Maybe something quite apt for the context."

            He didn’t turn his head, but four stagehands were busy moving a cabinet on wheels onto the very back of the stage.

            “Now, it wasn’t out of the question that Dan might have to take over from me, after the joke I’ve been made of, and do the show himself. But I didn’t think that would be helping anybody except myself,” Phil said, casually, “Even so, we’ve been working on some things that he can do, so he’ll be doing most of the work in this first trick,” he nonchalantly dropped his cane to the side of his legs and back-stepped until he was directly in front of the cabinet.

            Dan moved to stand beside him and brushed his hands on his suit jacket (the one with the flames adorning the sleeves and ankles), speaking up at last.

            “I thought it better to do it this way around because we've learned over this past 9 months that it seems as if my friend’s greatest talent is the art of disappearance,” he said, and he ushered Phil inside.

            “It’s a habit I should let die," Phil replied, still facing his audience. He seemed to perk up a little bit as he put his hands together behind his back and waited, “Ready, Daniel?”

            “Ready,” Dan nodded, and gently closed the door. He neatened up his outfit and cleared his throat.

            “I've been waiting to come out here for as long as you all have, but I could never do it without the real magician. So as he disappeared then and just now-“ (here he swung open the cabinet doors, “-He always reappears soon after…" and he gestured to the back of the theatre.

            The people in the nosebleeds couldn’t see him because they were above him, but on the bottom level, right at the back, there stood our magician.

            He started to walk to the stage as everybody started to clap again, but once more waved his hands to silence them.

            “You know me by now,” he said, matter-of-factly, “I can’t keep away from a stage. If it wasn't for what some made of me, I would have given this another shot a lot sooner," and he stepped back up on stage, "Perhaps I should explain."

            The crowd was silent.

            “It’s thanks to people like Dan here who gave me the confidence to get back up here,” Phil said, “So maybe before we continue the show, we could say a quick thank you to those guys. That’s Dan, PJ, Louise, Chris and whoever else was nice enough to not milk my mistakes for attention on the Internet," and he frowned momentarily before gesturing for a round of applause, which he got and joined in with.  

            “Maybe saying this was partly a way to get you to trust me, because for this next illusion, I’m going to need a volunteer… anybody?” he purred. His expression was not a reassuring one, but a show of hands went up nonetheless.

            “Really? I haven’t even told you what it is yet.”

            The hands stayed up.

            “Well, alright then. You, lady at the front? Would you like to come up on the stage?”

            The lady at the front very much would like to come up on the stage, and so she did, getting to her feet and looking a bit scared but mostly excited.

            “What’s your name?" Phil asked her, politely, when she was in front of him on the platform.

            “Susan.”

            “Good to meet you, Susan," he said, and shook her hand, “Would you like to know what you've just gotten yourself into?"

            Susan nodded her head.

            “Well, I hope you trust me with a saw…" Phil mumbled, then turned to his assistant, “…Dan, would you help bring out the box?"

           


	23. The One With the First Show, Part 2

            Phil wasn’t the one on the receiving end of this illusion here, but still, as he held the chainsaw in his hands, his life seemed to flash before his eyes.

            He knew how dicey this was, especially after what had happened before, but his assistant and his volunteer both seemed confident in him. He didn’t want to let them down, especially Dan. No matter how he thought this, though, his thoughts were flooded with the wonder of what would happen if he got this wrong. Arrest, probably. Court. Jail? He’d never live that down.

            His hands were shaking like leaves in a storm – he tended to have wobbly hands anyway but this was dangerous.

            He tried to assure himself that everything would be fine, that Susan, his volunteer, knew what was going on and had done everything just as they had told her. Dan was beside him, his taller shadow spreading out behind him from the lights shining in their faces.

            Phil swallowed and looked down to Susan, who had the same expression on her face that Dan sometimes had at random moments during the months after the incident. Dan had told him since that it was something to do with how his eyes looked: manic and wide with his pupils shrinking to dots in his clear-cut irises. Knowing that those were the looks that meant Dan was a little bit frightened of him, Phil let his shoulders relax and gave what he hoped looked like a genuine smile, mouthing the words ‘you alright?' to his volunteer. Receiving a confident nod, Phil looked up to his audience.

            “Usually a large, industrial buzz-saw would be used for this sort of thing, but we couldn’t fit it in the van,” he joked. It was the first joke he’d made that night. His spectators didn’t give so much of a chuckle: with Phil’s twitchy demeanour and past sudden disappearance it was clear nobody trusted him. He tried scanning the faces to find Louise to see what she was looking like, but he couldn't find her in the short few seconds he took.

            He gave a shrug, fiddling with the saw cord in his fingers.

            “Here goes," he said, and gave the cord a tug. This was the part Dan had made him practice so many times. The audience weren’t the only people who were sceptical about him manning heavy machinery. Cutting off his fingers or a whole arm would be a whole lot more serious than sliding a needle through a bit of skin.

            Dan watched him carefully, ready to step in if he got too shaky, but there was no need. Phil seemed to have quite a bit of confidence for once and waited a second, revving the saw before guiding it over to the box. He had to cut through the plywood, too, and a shower of dust flew down onto the stage as he worked. The hall was in dead hush as the chain made its way through the box and through Susan’s torso. The tension in the air was thick.

            Then complete silence as the motor stopped. The silence stayed as Phil stood straight again, pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose and made sure the saw was correctly powered off before handing it to Dan (who then passed it to a stagehand). Then, just to show that his volunteer had been cut the whole way through, he slid two blades into the gap he had made.

            “Ready?” Phil asked his assistant, and Dan gave a nod. They both took one end of the box each and rolled the wood apart, showing that, yes, Susan was now in two pieces.

            A round of applause echoed around, and Phil let them go on this time, patiently, composed, not smiling, his hands resting on his slender waist. Then he and Dan closed the box, he threw open the lid and he helped Susan to her feet, shaking her hand as she left the stage. Phil hushed the second round of applause. He didn’t like loud noises much.

            However much poise he had gained from that successful illusion, he wouldn't let himself get overconfident: that was what had led to the Needle Incident.

            As he thought this, the colour drained from his face and the theatre seemed to shift around him, turning into the one in London where it all went down. He didn’t have flashbacks very often, and it was bad timing right now, but he couldn’t snap himself out of it. He tried calling to Dan to pass him some prop or other or to help the stage hands clear away the box, but no sound came from his lips. No speech, no noise, not even a whimper. A sudden pain shot through his neck, right at the front, and his impulse was to set his fingers on the scars left from the needle. He felt like he was melting, a sour taste had started to creep up from his stomach to his throat but he swallowed it down, a frown on his face.

            As his eyes rested on Louise in the audience, everything shifted back to normal and he swiped his hand away from his neck, realizing what he was doing. He gave a discreet nod to Louise so she knew he was alright, and composed himself once more.

            The box was gone by now, the stage was clear aside from the pile of sawdust ahead of him. The only sign anything had ever been there.

            Phil knew he couldn’t stay silent, couldn’t make this awkward, but neither could he remember his script. He used to ad-lib a lot during these shows, always coming out with something witty or curious to draw people in to his next trick, but he knew that right now he shouldn’t risk doing that. If he was zoning out and he tried to fill in the blanks in his performance now, he’d probably end up monologuing about cereal or how much he liked sit-coms.

            “You doubted me then, didn’t you?” he smiled, smugly, eventually, to the crowd. In all reality, he probably doubted himself more than they did, “I promise there will be no more chainsaws tonight.”

            But even if there were no chainsaws, he was still dreading his closing act where he’d step inside the iron maiden and see the spikes in the door come towards him. He’d state that disappearing was kind of his ‘thing’ and he'd have a split second to finish the trick. There was a very real danger there if he wasn’t fast enough, and if he kept going woozy like he did now, he doubted he could do it.

            A big, soft hand brushed past his briefly then, though, and he flicked his gaze up to make eye contact with Dan, who communicated only in glances to him that he was right there to help if anything went wrong.

            Phil smiled at him, secretively. There had always been theories that their little brushes and glances were a secret code. Maybe they were. A code to let each other know that they were aware of what the other was thinking.

            Both the magician and his assistant turned back to their spectators. Phil adjusted the red top hat on his head and cleared his throat.

            “Not that our next trick won’t be less risky. Where’s the fun in something without a bit of adrenaline?” he hummed, coolly.

            Adrenaline wasn’t something he had had a lot of recently, but finding himself back on stage like this with a chainsaw and a spotlight and a theatre of scared eyes trained on him reminded him of one of the reasons why he started this in the first place.

He craved the fear, the vigour, the rush, and he didn’t think he could ever live without it.


	24. Backstage at the Palace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey! Sorry this chapter is a bit short; Word keeps crashing on me and it's making me want to stick my fingers in my eyes. Takes a lot of patience to keep on opening the same file just to finish a paragraph or whatever.   
> Also this is pretty cheesy, I'm not going to lie.  
> Please accept it. 
> 
> -NICER

            Some part deep down inside of Dan couldn’t believe they had actually done it. It seemed like only yesterday he was in the flat after that one fateful show, taking care of his friend, cleaning out his wounds, keeping him fed. Maybe there was a part of him that never really believed himself when he assured Phil they could get back to normal, but now he knew that had been right all along.

            To the noise of the audience’s standing ovation, to the curtains closing, to the lights spinning as the show ended, Dan turned to his left to see his best friend; beloved, enigmatic, somewhat stubborn, twisted in such a brilliant way, tears rolling down his cheeks. A smile cracked over his face as he stepped forward from where he had been stationed after disappearing in the iron maiden, out of view from anybody.

            Dan couldn’t help but grin back and stumble forward to lift him up under his arms and swing him round in a massive burst of energy. The one last bit of energy he possessed after such an exhausting show.

            Laughing tiredly, wildly, but quietly, he gently set his friend down on his feet again, brushing hairs out of his face and smiling, proudly,

            _“You did it, buddy!”_

Phil shook his head, swallowing and taking his hat off to hold it to his chest,

            “No," he said, under his breath, " _We_ did it, Dan."

            _"We sure did..."_ Dan whispered, his eyes brimming with tears, and he pulled Phil back into another hug. The jaggedness of his collar bones digging into his face wasn’t particularly comfortable for Dan here, but he wasn’t going to let that stop him.

            “Alright guys, great job, time for the curtain call!” PJ declared, appearing then, clapping his hands, firmly. He’d played a big part in making sure everything ran smoothly behind the scenes. Everybody had, in fact, so it was only natural that they had a curtain call.

            The first thing Dan knew as he pulled away was PJ’s hand on his shoulder. He turned to face him and was met with an expression of pride and satisfaction.

            “You two did amazing,” he assured them both, “I think this has been a huge success!"

            And it had been. If you hadn’t have known what had been going on before, and without all the references to it, you would never have been able to guess that they had ever been away. No big faults, no flaws in the set, the ideal atmosphere pictured and set out to capture the entire mood. It was pretty much perfect.

            The viewers clearly thought so, too, because as soon as the stagehands and the performers stepped back out on the stage, there came the loudest applause all night. A standing ovation to show their approval, their support, their adoration.

            Phil's gaze settled on the sceptics in the bleachers he saw still seated, not clapping, only frowning. He knew that with his mistake, these people would always be there and there was nothing he could do about it. That was just something he had to live with now, though, he supposed. It didn’t really matter. He had a huge following of people who genuinely liked him – they didn’t care if he made one little mistake – and he had Dan by his side all the way, and that was all that mattered.

            He turned to his right to look to Dan, then, and they made eye contact, the spotlight shimmering off the sequins and flames on Howell’s suit. Phil never really thought he'd be here again.

           Now he knew Dan had been right all along.

 

* * *

 

           The journey home in the van was a lot calmer than the last one. Phil especially recognised this, because he had been knocked out from the pills the last time, but now he got to watch the lights as they drove.

           He was just about drifting off, with his head resting on a cushion pressed against the window, when he heard a snippet of conversation that piqued his interest.

 _“Is he asleep?”_ came a voice from the driver’s seat.

          “I _think_ so…” Dan mumbled beside him, sounding tired himself.

          “You think he'll be awake for the party?"

          Phil's eyes shot open and he sat bolt upright,

         “What party?” he asked, cocking his head to the side.

         “Oh… thought you were asleep,” Dan chuckled, “It was meant to be a surprise for you, back at the flat. We were all going to get together and celebrate the success. I suppose it won’t be much of a surprise anymore, though, huh?”

        Phil gave a gentle snicker and pulled his hoodie sleeves further down, turning his hands into soft paws.

        “I was still surprised… Thank you, Dan,” he said, letting his head fall onto his friend’s shoulder, then looked up to the backs of the front seats, "And thank you, you two. It means a lot that you’d want to do that for me…"

        “No problem!" smiled Cornelia from the driver’s seat.

        “The least we could do,” added Martyn.


	25. Our Magician Has an Idea

 

Sometimes you don't realise how many people you actually know until they're all stood in a very small flat together.  
For Phil, who had already had a pretty long day and hadn't seen most people here in at least a year, it had all proved a bit too overwhelming after the first half an hour of being home. He'd since retreated to the balcony where he stood looking out over Manchester. with his waistcoat unbuttoned and hanging off his svelte figure. It was early morning by now and he really fancied a nap.  
He knew what he wanted to say to everyone in that room - his friends, Tom, Hazel, Louise, PJ, Chris, and the team who had helped him throughout his comeback show - but he just didn't know how to start. 

"You doing OK?" came Dan's voice from behind him, and so Phil straightened his back and turned to face him. 

"Yeah, I'm good," he nodded with a smile. 

"Are you going to tell them your idea?" Dan asked.

"How do you think they'll take it?" Phil whispered, rubbing his hands together to warm them in the cold chill, "Do you think they'll tell me I'm getting ahead of myself? That I need to slow down or something? Or that it's a bad idea altogether?"

"It'll be fine, I'm sure they'll all be very supportive. You remember how excited they were about this one show, don't you?"

"Yes, I suppose you're right... Can you help me?"

"Help you what?"

"With starting it. Can you stand next to me."

Dan nodded his agreement and took his friend around the shoulders to lead him back inside. 

They took their place at the doorway to the living room where everybody could hear them and see them, looking out onto all the people, feeling slightly nervous. 

"Can we have your attention for a minute?" Dan asked, but nobody heard him. He repeated it louder, tapping a glass with a spoon, and the room fell silent. You could hear a fly sneeze.

Phil felt everybody's eyes drilling into him, and as Dan told him to speak up, his heart started skipping every other beat. Somehow talking to a small bundle of people was scarier than talking in front of the massive audience earlier at the Palace Theatre. 

"Hi... guys..." he started, stretching his fingers and fidgeting from nerves, "I just wanted to thank you all for coming first of all. And for all the support you've given me for the show. Especially those of you who stuck with me even in inactivity. The comeback show was a huge success and I couldn't have asked for anything more from you guys. So I just wanted to say that: thank you."  
Before he could continue, he was interrupted with a round of clapping. As much as he appreciated it, he still wasn't finished. 

"But this is just the beginning!" he declared with a short, manic laugh, and when the room was quiet again, he swallowed and composed himself, "I had an... idea. A- a proposition, if you will..." he stuttered, rubbing his hands, "But- but only if you're all OK with it..."

 _"Get on with it, buddy,"_ Dan whispered to him, and he nodded. 

"A world tour!" he said, confidently, "All around the globe. Mexico, Russia, Japan, the USA - everywhere! It's always been my dream to travel the world doing what I love, entertaining, making people happy, and I know it was on the cards before. Just consider it, just think how great we could be! We're a team again now, and I know it sounds corny, but I really think that as a team we can make this work. So what do you say? Are you with me?"

And they were. 


	26. Adrenaline Junkie

Planning a world tour was going to be a lot of hard work. Even harder than planning the comeback show. And that was saying something. 

Phil lay in bed that night - or rather, morning - staring at the ceiling. He should have been asleep, he was exhausted, and he only had an hour or two before he would begin to see the sunrise through his bedroom curtains. But there he lay. Peaceful, warm, with his slender hands placed resting over his stomach. 

He closed his eyes at last, his eyelids stinging, and breathed a sigh. There was a lot to think about. Had he made the right decision, even? Was he jumping into this too suddenly? Did he seem too eager? 

He decided he needed to stop doubting himself. After all, that was what had gotten him into this mess in the first place. It seemed like so long ago when he was confident, perky, bright-eyed and full-figured. Then he dipped to the opposite: withdrawn, hot-tempered and hollow-cheeked. People before would come up to him, excitedly, and greet him with hugs and smiling faces. Now they avoided him as much as they could, trying not to make a wrong move. But Phil resolved to change that.

He remembered being backstage on the night that he made his mistake, how much he'd shivered and cried and begged to sleep, given tablets until he was oblivious, instead of getting up and handling the situation as he should have, and he regretted every minute of it. But it was all over now, at least. 

A nervous knock pulled him back to the real world, and he opened one eye to blearily gaze over to the door. 

"Come in," he said, knowing it would be his flatmate, and indeed it was. 

Dan wandered in, looking just as tired as Phil, and gave a weary smile. He sat down at the foot of the bed without a word, righted the blanket and laid his hand down on Phil's legs. 

"I, uh..." he mumbled, then stopped to clear his throat, "I just wanted to tell you something."

"Go on?"

"I thought I'd let you know just how much fun this whole thing has been... because you've made it fun. Because, for the first time in I-don't-even-know how long, you've been... you. And I've missed that," Dan said, very quietly, as though he was embarrassed about saying it.

Phil gave one of his knowing smirks and dragged himself to sit upright, his t-shirt hanging loosely off him (a year or so ago, he would have filled it), and leaned on his hands. 

"Me too," he smiled, looking quite happy with himself although still tired. He looked at his friend's face and realised he wasn't finished. 

"But... are you really sure you want to do this?" Dan asked, swallowing and making eye contact at last, "I mean, this is a big jump; from inactivity to a world tour..."

Phil scoffed, loudly, rolling his eyes. He practically rolled out of bed and stumbled over to the red top hat on his desk. 

"Listen, Danny," he started, tripping over his words slightly, "This is the best thing I've done in years! I forgot how much I loved it, Dan. The adrenaline, the excitement! Everyone's eyes watching me, the gasping, the awe they were in! You don't understand, Dan, it feels amazing."

Of course, he was an adrenaline junkie. Dangerous tricks and the prospect of maybe accidentally cutting someone in half appealed to him. What a freak, Dan thought. 

"I'm sure it does, bud, but don't you think you're being a bit hasty?" he asked. 

"Oh, pl-ease," Phil chuckled, a bit too confidently, that sly grin cracking across his slender face, "You were the one who wanted me to do this. Don't tell me you're looking back now."

"No, I just..." Dan sighed. Clearly, his housemate was getting a bit reckless from the busy day and so he decided not to push anything, "Lie   
back down, get some rest," he said, gesturing to the bed. 

Phil rolled his eyes but got comfy again nonetheless and begrudgingly let Dan tuck the duvet around him. He didn't feel as if he could fall asleep before, but now he was warm and snug, he felt himself drifting off, not even noting Dan saying goodnight to him. 

Dan Howell slipped soundlessly out of the room, still thinking about the tour as he went, and closed the door gently behind him. He went back to his own room, where he got under the bedsheets and forced himself to think of things that would send him to sleep. 

He lay there staring until he saw the first rays of dawn leak through his window.


	27. Nobody Likes Phil's Idea and They all Want to Tell Him

Hotels had always been relaxing places for Phil Lester.  
His room at home had too many dark corners. Too many secrets, too many places where his semi-asleep brain had told him there were things hiding. He would lie awake thinking of the face he hallucinated one night hovering over him, of the eyes he'd convinced himself were watching him from the cracks between the furniture, or of the killer his head told him was definitely waiting in the corner.  
Hotels had none of that. Hotels had fresh, crisp bed linens, wall-mounted TVs and complimentary shampoo. And while something bad was probably more likely to happen in a hotel than in his own home, somehow Phil was comforted.  
It had been a year since the comeback show. The world tour was a few shows in and their current location was Rhodes, Greece. The whole thing would be televised and so a few especially 'extreme' tricks had been planned just for the camera. They weren't edited, of course, Phil was an honest person, and there would still be a live audience, but they were way more elaborate and risky than what would be performed on stage. One of these tricks would take place on an expansive beach in a show in the near future: our magician would be buried alive with only about 4 minutes to escape. There was a secret room hidden 6 feet under, of course, and an escape route from the coffin, but the audience didn't know that and - if Phil wasn't quick enough - there was still an all-too-real danger to it.  
Phil had seen Houdini do something similar before and had wanted to try it for a while now. Dan wasn't fond of the idea. He wasn't fond of a lot of Phil's ideas, especially not ones that might put him in danger. But if it made him happy, Dan supposed, it was what they would do.  
He looked across at his pale-faced, hollow-cheeked, eccentric co-performer, and Phil looked straight back at him from his bed across the room.  
"Thinking?" Phil asked.  
"Yes." Dan replied in a whisper.  
Their crew would be sleeping in the rooms surrounding and he didn't want to speak so loud as to wake them, although everyone was so exhausted from the flight that he doubted a bit of chit-chat would disturb them.  
"Are you sure you want to do this?"  
"Do what?" Phil hummed, his sharp green eyes almost glowing in the darkness of the hotel room.  
"The trick. The buried alive trick. Do you really want to do it?"  
“Of course I do. I’m aiming high.”  
“Aren’t you scared?” Dan asked.  
“I’m terrified,” came Phil’s reply, “But when am I not?” he hummed. He was right, too. Being a magician had always been a nerve-wreaking job for him. He didn’t like crowds, was very clumsy and had never really liked to be the centre of attention, but he had a passion for something and if he could make people happy by doing what he loved, he was going to do it. That was where Dan came in: emotional support, somebody to be there when you needed him.  
“You’re not obliged to go through with it – there’s still time to call it off,” Dan said then, assuredly. He stretched out an arm as if he was going to put his hand on his friend’s shoulder, but he couldn’t reach all the way to the other bed. He left his arm there, lying on it until it went numb, as he just about saw Phil shake his head, slowly.  
“When I’ve said I’ll do something, I’m going to do it,” he said, “And that’s that,” and he turned over.  
They were the last words spoken that night. 

 

Both our performers and their crew met the next morning at the hotel restaurant downstairs for breakfast. They didn’t all fit around one table, of course, so they took up about five in all. The place was mostly empty, apart from a few elderly couples and one family (of whom, Dan was sure, the father took a picture).  
Breakfast was eaten with disscussions of the show coming up. The subject of the ‘burial’ trick was popular today. Phil was asked the same question Dan had asked him last night by various members of his crew, more times than he would have liked. He tackled the first two or three with a smile and a reassuring chuckle. Whether it was the start of him doubting himself or just getting impatient, however, on the fourth enquiry of ‘are you sure?’, he lost his temper. With an impatient, slightly too loud snap of ‘STOP IT!’, he slammed his hand on the table, accidently alerting the attention of the particularly grumpy elderly couple seated not far from them.  
His anger dissipated, melting off his face like hot chocolate, and as he looked up to the people at his table he saw what he feared the most: a hint of disappointment. In what seemed like a blur, he felt a tug at his sleeve and shifted his gaze to see Dan whispering the word ‘calm’ to him in an undertone.  
Phil put his head in his hands and apologised to whoever he had snapped at, then felt a hand move to rub his back. He didn’t bother to push it away, just sulked a bit longer in his own self-pity before lifting his head again, the lights of the restaurant blinding him momentarily.  
“I’m glad you’re being ambitious,” said the flyman, “Just be careful.”  
But his words morphed to nothing but a drone in Phil’s ears as he tried to pull himself out of his daze. He’d thought about it last night and he’d thought about it this morning - did they not trust him? Had they lost faith in him since the needle incident? Didn’t they think he could handle a bit of danger? Was that why they were asking? It was an insult. But it made him think.  
He lifted his fuzzy gaze to the coffee pot on the table, set in-amongst a mess of plates, cups, some bowls (still with yoghurt, fruit and walnuts left inside), a jar of honey and a half-eaten roll of bread. He reached out for the coffee pot and poured himself another half-cup (his third). He’d have to head out to the beach later to see how the setup was going, and he really didn’t want to, - not with his crew, not with questions – he just wanted to be alone, and to wake up properly.  
The violent pounding in his chest told him he probably shouldn’t drink any more caffiene.


	28. It's Hot in Rhodes

The sweltering heat of the sun was not something that Phil or Dan were used to. The beach was particularly hot, and not even a sleeveless shirt was doing a good job of keeping Dan cool. 

The sun’s rays were beaming down inconveniently into Phil’s eyes and he raised his hand to shield against them, squinting to see the group of people a way away from him, busy covering something up in a pit of sand. This was the set of the ‘buried alive’ trick—an underground room that Phil could slip into and hide in until the trick was over and he could climb out. 

The group all raised their heads and waved at Dan, Phil and the rest of the crew as they approached. Phil really didn’t want to have to talk to them – he was getting nervous already, his heart beating up his throat and his hands shaking, even though the show wasn’t until tomorrow. 

“We’re just finishing up,” said one girl, clearly squinting, although her eyes were covered by big, orange sunglasses, “We’re going to test it a few times before you can try it out.”

Phil had no problem with waiting for a while. His stomach had twisted into a knot and he was resisting the urge to hold onto Dan’s arm to keep himself steady. 

“Should be perfectly functional,” came somebody’s voice, but Phil wasn’t paying attention. He had faith in himself to pull off the trick right, but he had a feeling that nobody else did. Was there something he didn’t know? He was starting to get paranoid now. 

Phil listened to his crew talk at him for as long as they needed to, then left the group at the soonest possible point to walk his cramps off along the beach. 

The waves turned to ripples and splashed against the shore, the water creeping up the sand, spreading out far enough to almost touch the magician’s feet. A layer of foam remained on the sand and Phil found his eyes following the pattern it made all the way along the coast. His mind wandered. An onslaught of unwanted memories of the needle, the hiatus, the disappointment, the comeback show… could he not just go about his life without those things haunting him? He distracted his mind by practising his Greek. 

Parakalo  e mpistépsou me... 

“ PHIL!”

“Naí?” 

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Called Dan, whom Phil could see standing quite a distance away, using his hand as a shield against the sun. 

“Walking.”

“PARDON?”

“WALKING,” Phil shouted back, throwing his hands down violently as if it might make his voice louder. Dan clearly wasn’t satisfied with that reply because he started to walk towards him, looking weary from the heat.

“Where are you walking to?” he asked when he got close enough. 

“Just along the beach,” Phil replied.

“Can I join you?”

“If you like.”

They wandered in silence for a bit, staring down at the gold blanket of sand, thinking their own thoughts – the subjects of which were probably not too distant from each other. 

“What’s wrong?” Dan asked eventually. 

“Got cramp,” Phil replied.

“It’s not just that, though. What is it, really?”  
Dan could read him like a book.

_“Don’t they trust me?”_ Phil breathed, quietly enough so that Dan might not hear, but loud enough because he still wanted to say it. 

“I trust you,” Dan assured him, “They just don’t trust the set. It’s a risky decision to go through with this and it has a lot of dangers tied to it.”

“They don’t say it like they mistrust the set.”

“They say it because they care about you.”

“It’s not helping anyone,” Phil frowned, then stopped in his tracks and knelt down on the ground, “Look, I’ll demonstrate.”  
He got together a handful of sand and started to form it into a tall, slim tower. It was precariously balanced and would probably topple over if you breathed on it too violently. Phil looked up to Dan. 

“This is my confidence,” he said, simply. He then stood up again and brushed himself down, the grains of sand still sticking to his legs, “...Now imagine my foot is everybody’s choice of conversational topic.” 

He lifted his right foot and mercilessly kicked down the sand tower, accompanied by some demolition sound effects made with his mouth. His message was dramatic but clear. 

Dan gave a sympathetic sigh,

“I know, bud,” he said, looping an arm around his friend’s shoulders and leading him on down the beach, “Try and ignore them. You’re the expert. I have faith in you, even if they don’t. The set is the only thing that could possibly make a mistake in the trick, and that wouldn’t be your fault.”

“You don’t think I’ll mess it up?” Phil swallowed, moving a hand to around his neck as if he were remembering something. 

Dan swiped his hand away,

“If anything goes wrong, and I don’t think it will...” he said, “I know it would n’t be your fault.”

Phil looked up as Dan’s hands grasped his shoulders,

“I believe in you. You’re my best friend and sometimes I can’t help but worry about you. Don’t listen to anybody else – they don’t know you like I do,” he said, “Don’t think about anything you might have done wrong in the past, think of all those great  things you did  _right_ .” 

“ Thanks, Dan-”  


_“_ _Don’t let anyone get you down and I’m here if you need anything_ _or even just somebody to talk to. Don’t be afraid to tell me if you’re rethinking a trick or if_ _somebody is getting on your nerves. I’m here for support-”  
_

“Yes, thanks, Dan,” Phil stopped him with a wan smile, “I will. Don’t worry about it.”

Dan smiled back, his dimples showing and the sun glinting in his eyes,

“Good!” he grinned, “That’s good...” 


	29. Tick Tock

Phil Lester, for one, was feeling very confident. 

His doubts and fears from the days before had dissipated into non-existence, leaving him in a dreamlike, oddly serene state. He trusted himself, trusted the set, believed in his years of experience, and didn’t care any more about other people’s uncertainties. He was ready to commit to this now. Why was he risking his life for a trick? Simple. It was fun, and people enjoyed it. And that was just the sort of person Phil Lester was. 

He stood on the hot sand of the beach, with the set laid out before him and Dan by his side. They were surrounded by the film crew and, a few steps further back, a relatively small audience. 

Dan looked nervous. As he should. 

The trick had been introduced a few minutes earlier and one of the stagehands was currently showing off the wooden coffin on the sand. There also had been some safety announcements, as there was a very real danger of the whole thing going terribly wrong. Suffocation was a strong possibility. This is why Dan was nervous. 

He would have made the announcements himself, as he was supposed to, but he didn’t think he could manage to tell a lifeless camera all about the way his best friend was in mortal danger. Instead, he stood beside Phil, his heart thundering, dreading the moment he’d have to wait to see if he’d live. He turned to his friend but the look he got wasn’t very comforting. It was one of Phil’s older ‘looks’, from the times where he was starting out his career and was still overly confident: a slow-forming smirk accompanied by the stare of dead, empty eyes. 

The cue for him to move came from the director, and, before Dan could so much as say goodbye in case this was the last time he could speak to him, Phil had stepped away. A dagger of doubt and fear shot through Dan’s heart. Something felt off. He felt like something was going to go wrong. 

The magician stood over the coffin, the set lights and moonshine casting his shadow over its hollow carcass. He didn’t come across as scared. His casual demeanour didn’t do much to help calm the other stagehands, though, who blindfolded him when he was seated in the casket. His hands were shackled with leather straps to the insides and he laid down with an air of confidence that wouldn’t have been present had this taken place just a few months before. 

Dan watched this all take place out of the corner of his eye, watched the wooden lid be placed down and nailed atop the coffin, thought that maybe this might be the last glimpse he ever got of his housemate, and went on telling the audience what was happening. His eyes met the camera, not wanting to look as the casket was roped to a small crane hook and slowly lowered into the ground – into the hole that was being dug yesterday morning when they walked along the beach after breakfast. Dan remembered the conversation he’d had on the beach with his friend, and it struck him that that may be one of the most surreal memories he’d retain. Talking in the hot sun with the peaceful sound of the waves crashing along the shore. It felt like only minutes ago. 

“Phil has 3 minutes to complete the trick...” Dan breathed, shakily, as the hole was topped with sand, “Until he runs out of oxygen...” and he started the clock. 

The sound of the stopwatch ticking from his hand met his ears. How could he hear it over all the other noise? Was it just his imagination? 

‘He should be out of the shackles by this point,’ he thought to himself, his heart clattering still. He shivered, partly from the night chill, but mostly from nerves, and he clutched Phil’s hat in his spare hand.

Tick, tock, tick tock...

What would he remember of Phil if he were to die tonight? Would his memories mostly be of being in the flat with a housemate that seemed cold and was far too pale and far too quiet? The Phil with hollowed-out cheeks who walked with his hands in his pockets and his head down?

Tick, tock, tick, tock…

No. His memories would be of the Phil who he met all those years ago at Piccadilly Station. The one with a soft, gentle face and a beaming grin and energy that knew no boundaries. That was the one he’d met in 2009 and that was the one who he had recently been beginning to see again. Because that was the one with the dream, with a hope, who had started this whole thing and fought through with it even when it looked like everything was going to fall apart. 

Tick, tock, tick, tock...

Because that was who came to mind when Dan thought ‘Phil’. 

He could still hear his voice, right at the back of his mind, in a sort of sunny haze, as he introduced himself. He’d had that look in his eye that he was someone who would do anything if he really put his mind to it. A trustworthy look. Friendly. Happy. 

Tick, tock, tick, tock… 

Dan looked down to the stopwatch in his hand. There were only 30 seconds left until the 3 minutes for the trick was up. If no gloved hand emerged from the sand in the next 30 seconds, there would be big trouble. What would happen then? They’d stop the recording, probably, and start digging up the coffin. Call an ambulance. Usher away the groups of concerned fans. Dan didn’t want that to happen – he didn’t want to see his friend dead – it couldn’t happen like this. All of a sudden. Just as things were getting better… right? 

He found himself whispering, repeating Phil’s name in a stunned terror, as the clock ticked down to 10 seconds. His heart felt like it was vibrating, pulling out the beats in elongated stutters. With every other beat, his chest would have the sensation of caving in, collapsing, trying to push itself out of his back. 

The trick should be over by now.

He was looking out for Phil’s hand. He should be climbing out. He only had 10 seconds. Where was he? Where was he?? 

The clock is ticking.

9

8

7

6

5

It was already too late, though. It had been too late for a while now. Phil should have been on his feet already taking a bow as the audience applauded, with an air of ecstasy and relief. Amazement. Adoration. 

But no.

No, it didn’t matter about the remaining few seconds. It wasn’t worth hoping for a better outcome. Dan knew better. Dan felt it. In 3 seconds his best friend would be dead. Maybe his best friend was already dead.

“I trusted you...” he whispered to himself, staring down at the ground with dry, stinging eyes. Moments ago he would have grasped the magician’s hand and pulled him up out of the sand to live another day. To take a bow and to say ‘I told you you could trust me!’.

He shouldn’t have done this trick. Dan shouldn’t have let him do this trick. It was far too dangerous, far too life-threatening. But it had happened. It had gone ahead anyway because that was what was going to make Phil happy. 

The last thing that was ever going to make him happy.

Dan didn’t even get to say goodbye.

Three.

Two.

One.


	30. Dead Sand

The shock and panic didn’t hit Dan Howell at first, but when it did, it was one of the worst feelings he’d ever had. 

He dropped the stopwatch and it fell to the ground with a ‘thump’ reminiscent of what his heart had felt like when it dawned on him. His heavy breathing and a soft murmuring of the crowds were the only sounds about. Everything else was silent. There had been too long of a silence… it was still carrying on… why was no-one doing anything?

The sound of ticking was still ringing in Dan’s ears, reminding him that time was up. That this was the end. 

Or was it? 

If they acted quick, he told himself… if they hurried… they might be able to save him.

“Cut the cameras!” Dan ordered, snapping around to the film crew. 

How long did they have? Minutes? Seconds?

Dan was angry. Angry at the set, at the crew, at himself… mostly at himself. Not at Phil, this wasn’t his fault. He was a skilled magician. He could have pulled this off no problem if the set was right… it was broken… it was the set’s fault… and the people who prepared it. 

Why wasn’t the digger moving? Why weren’t the first aiders doing anything? Time was up, it had been over 4 minutes since the trick started. Why was nobody panicking? 

Dan looked around for Pj or anybody he trusted, but couldn’t find anybody because his vision was pumping from the adrenaline. He felt like he was going to pass out. Have a heart attack, maybe. 

He kept repeating it in his mind: ‘Phil is dead, Phil is dead, I can’t do anything, he’s dead...’

Maybe it was intentional. Was it intentional? Had Phil meant for this to happen? Meant to die? Dan didn’t even want to think of why he would do that or what that could mean. He wouldn’t do that. Phil would never do that.

Dan’s eyes fluttered over the sand. 5 minutes and still no sign of the magician. No slender, red-gloved fingers reaching gracefully and majestically out of the earth. No…

He lifted his eyes to the idle ambulance on standby, to the digger that had poured the sand over the top of the buried casket, and finally to the first aid crew. Everybody was still. 

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Dan bellowed, angrily throwing down the hat in his hand, “DIG HIM UP!”

Dan wished he could be anywhere but here… any time but now. Even if back at the flat months and months ago. In fact, he’d rather be in the flat, in the dark as usual, where he could tell Phil’s stupid face that it didn’t matter what he chose to do so long as he was happy with it. Dan also found, to his own sheer astonishment, that he’d rather be at home being shouted at. Or that he’d stood up to his friend in the hotel just days before and told him that this trick couldn’t happen. It was too dangerous. It wasn’t worth it. Nothing was worth this. 

His vision blurred as if he was looking through a wobbly hand-held camera and he turned a few circles to scan the area. What was he looking for? Who was he looking for? He didn’t even know anymore. There came a grumble of an engine as somebody started up the digger. Finally. It was as if they didn’t even care, or they thought maybe if they waited a bit longer, the magician might re-emerge. But the digger was likely all too late now. 

Phil was 5 minutes past the time he’d been given. There was no way he could have survived down there for that long. The oxygen in the coffin would have run out long ago, or perhaps the whole thing had collapsed from the weight of the sand and crushed his slender form. Dan bet he was lying lifeless, still in the casket, his blood cold and his skin gaining a blue tinge. 

At least one magician had died attempting this stunt in the past, and others gained terrible injuries, and Dan knew it. Houdini couldn’t do it so how could Phil?

Dan dropped to his knees and dug at the sand, violently, hoping to find something – anything – even if it be a cold, dead hand. His tears spattered the grains beneath him. His mind threw images of his best friend at him until his face plastered the backs of his eyes. He couldn’t be dead… please don’t let him be dead.

And that was when Dan felt something. And his breath caught. And the grumble of the digger stopped. Something soft and spidery that gripped his hand back.

“Phil! Oh my goodness- PHIL!!!” Dan yelled, frantically grasping at the hand and pulling as hard as he could manage.

To his relief, it didn’t take much to help his friend out of the ground. His heart felt like it had stopped for the last minute and that it had risen up into his mouth and threatened to jump out. But he managed, with the one thought in his head that there was hope. 

Phil snaked to his feet like a long ribbon, streams of sand rolling like waterfalls off his body, from over his shoulders and the dips in his collar. He stood straight once more, coughing up a mouthful of dirt and shaking the rest out of his hair. 

And he stood there, in that manner he had, like a silhouette cast against the glow of the moon, as if nothing in the world had happened.

Dan swallowed his heart back down, still panting heavily. He laid his hands on Phil’s forearms, feeling the familiar, cold chill of his skin that in any other circumstance wouldn’t have been calming but in this single one was.

“What happened?” he breathed, resting two fingers upon Phil’s neck to find his pulse, as if needing affirmation that he was, in fact, alive. And he was. As alive as he’d ever been, if not more so, “...I thought we’d lost you...”

Phil’s mouth turned up at the corner into a smile. A smile that spoke without him needing to, but he did anyway. 

“You’re not losing me any time soon,” he whispered with a sympathetic air, his eyes tired and yet glad, “...I’m not going anywhere. Not again.”


	31. A Maunder About Making Things Work

 

The rest of the tour seemed to pass in a blur. The ‘buried alive’ trick had caused a good swathe of commotion on the internet and had even earned a feature on a few news sites. ‘The Trick That Almost Killed AmazingPhil!’ and ‘You Won’t Believe How Close This Magician Came to Death’ were among the most popular click-bait articles written on it. Of course, some people believed strongly that it was a publicity stunt, and whatever anybody else told them, they wouldn’t change their mind.

 

Dan and the crew knew better. Phil had informed them that there was, in fact, quite a serious danger. He related that he had only just managed to clamber out of the sand before he ran out of air. He’d decided to carry out the illusion in a slightly different method to prior magicians, which nobody was very happy about, as it made the whole thing slightly riskier. Indeed it had proved to be a somewhat unfavourable decision, but, as Phil had phrased it, ‘I’m still alive, aren’t I?’.

 

But that was Phil for you.

 

With the popularity he was gaining, the question of what really happened at the Harold Pinter Theatre in London when he inexplicably disappeared was bound to come up soon – and it did.

 

Dan had asked about what the plan was for dealing with the questions and whether Phil still wanted it to be an unspoken horror, but to his surprise, Phil remained rather calm about the whole thing. He accepted one of the first interview offers he received. Dan was shocked. So was everybody else, in fact. The interview took place on a live chat show late at night. There was a relatively modest-sized audience. Dan sat beside his friend on a long sofa as the presenter asked them question after question. Phil answered them all sedately and mildly. And then came the big question:

 

“I’m sure everyone’s wondering...” the interviewer started, glancing down at the notes on his desk, “What really happened at that show in October last year? And why-... why didn’t you come back for so long?”

 

The audience’s tension raised so that the air felt as if it was somehow static and fat. Dan turned to Phil, whose posture and assured expression had not wavered for a second, awaiting his response and the audience’s reaction. He could only imagine...

 

“It was mostly… humiliation, I think,” Phil began, laying his clasped hands on his crossed knees. He sat with a certain potency that he hadn’t had for a while, not as if he looked down on people or he felt that he was of authority, but rather as if he was looking out and observing.

 

He explained to everyone, in a round-about way, what he’d done and made sure to include the fact that it wasn’t _just_ the needle that was bad, and that it was definitely necessary that he had to go offstage. Because maybe deep down he was still scared of people invalidating him. And they didn’t. Not his _real_ supporters, anyway. There were always going to be, and always had been, people who didn’t like him. And that was a fact.

 

He and Dan spoke about a lot of things to do with the hiatus – and, of course, the return show – that night. Dan let slip a hint that the needle trick may be making a comeback, and that it did. It went pretty well, taking place on the last show of the world tour, back in the Harold Pinter Theatre in London. Old memories. Familiar sights. Same old tricks.

 

The whole tour had been a roller-coaster of emotions for Dan. The joy of having his best friend back mixed with the stress of travelling, the panic he’d had over the burial feat, the uncanny vibe his friend was still giving off and the nostalgia of seeing all these old illusions again. Though he’d soon realise that the uncanny vibe was the same one that Phil had always given off and was just getting back again.

 

Dan raised his eyes to look up to him that night at the Harold Pinter Theatre, seeing the lengthy needle safely lodged into the layer of glue at the front of his neck, metal glinting in the spotlight. He didn’t know what he’d have done if he’d have lost him back on the beach in Rhodes. That faraway but full of life glimmer that the magician’s eyes had to them – that they hadn’t had in those days in the flat – just made Dan feel… nostalgic… and _heavy-hearted_ in a weird way. He was so proud of his best friend and yet also so exhausted.

 

He really wanted to go home. Back to his own bed and his own sofa and where he could look out over his own balcony at the familiar sights around him. He just wanted to relax for once and maybe talk to his housemate for a while.

 

They’d been through a lot recently. It had all seemed to go in a blur.

 

It seemed like only days ago they had met for the first time. Dan had always known, from that day, that something was going to happen. Phil just seemed like that sort of character. Something big was going to happen. And it did.

 

In the blink of an eye, they were finishing their long-anticipated world tour.

 

It felt almost as if it wasn’t real. A simulation. Especially the burial trick. That was the part where everything felt the fastest. Dan remembered how his heart had felt when he’d been so convinced his friend was dead. It was as if his life was flashing before his eyes as he frantically clawed at the sand. He hadn’t enjoyed that. He’d only forgiven Phil because he was so relieved to have him alive and well. But now all the excitement had tired him out. They were finally heading home and, to be honest, all he wanted to do was sit down and have some crisps.

 

He’d worked hard over the past months and he couldn’t help but be rather proud of himself. Phil seemed happy too. That’s all that mattered. People were happy. That’s what Phil had always wanted, wasn’t it? For people to be happy? Well, he certainly got that wish.

 

He’d always been asked at several interviews, or by kids, whether magic was real. It was a question bound to come up. Any other magician probably would have said ‘yes, of course, it is!’ to keep children’s dreams alive for a while longer or to make themselves seem talented and one-of-a-kind. But Phil was just any other magician – he couldn’t bring himself to tell a lie – he had his own way of responding to that question.

 

 _“_ _No, it’s not real,”_ he’d always say with a slight smile, and the look on the child’s face would turn sad for a second before he continued, _“’Magic’ is all about illusion. Sleight of hand. And I think that makes it even better because anybody can be a magician, all it takes is a bit of fiddling and a keen eye.”_

 

 _“_ _Could I be a magician, too?”_ the kid would ask in wonder, and Phil would give a reassuring nod.

 

 _“Of course you can!”_ He said, _“Just go out and try!”_

 

Dan liked this answer better than the normal one. He agreed with Phil. The great thing about magic is that _anybody_ can learn it with some determination. It was something he’d always favoured about Phil’s style – an alternative approach. But somehow he made it work.

 

Making things work was a talent.

 

A stage show, a world tour… who’d have guessed they’d end up here? With the following of fans that they had? All the way from Phil being only an illusionist by hobby, then with some hard work and perseverance, climbing his way up to party magician. Talented in his trade. Of course, he couldn’t have done it without Dan, without Pj, without any of his companions. He might not say it very often, but everybody knew he was very grateful.

 

Dan supposed that the lesson, at the end of the day, was to stick at what you loved, and that, even if you stumble, it’s probably not nearly as bad as you think it is... And that you can do anything if you (as Phil would say) _‘Just go out and try’._

 

Or maybe that was digging too deep.

 

Whatever it was, Dan was very, very glad to have his friend back, and that he wasn’t disappearing anywhere any time soon.


	32. The Show is Over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. So. I'm here again.   
> I believe this is the final chapter, so thank you for sticking with me if you've made it this far. If you have, give yourself a gold star. If you haven't... well, you wouldn't be seeing this right now, so it doesn't really matter.  
> Anyway. Enjoy this hopefully last chapter. This was pretty fun. 
> 
> -NICER

 

It was dark, late at night, with the muffled noise of cars grumbling past surrounding him, when Phil stood on his balcony at home at last. He was thinking. Musing. As had always been his habit.

 

Tonight he was thinking all about the hiatus period at home and how non-existent it seemed now, as if it had never really happened.

 

He’d overheard so much about himself in those odd months. He’d done so much shifty and stupid stuff that made Dan nervous, and he knew it. He remembered those times he was skulking around the apartment, as quiet as death and as pale as it, too. He looked like milk that had been left out on the counter for a month or two.

 

He heard Dan on the phone to Louise the one time he invited her around to try and talk some sense into him. It hadn’t been that long ago, but it felt like ages:

 

 _“It’s not that he can't hide what he feels, no,”_ Phil heard Dan say. He knew he was trying to be quiet because his voice was hushed, but Phil could still hear every word and every breath, _“I just don’t think he wants to. I think he needs me to know. Like a cry for help."_

 

Dan’s voice seemed to crack a little bit as he spoke. Phil had little to no sympathy for him – he’d gone cold a long time ago and no matter how much he cared for someone, he couldn’t understand them crying over him. ‘A cry for help’? How overemotional can you get? He knew what Dan was saying, though, and agreed with it. It was a cry for help of sorts, he supposed: being like he was. He’d always been a pillar for people to lean on, especially Dan, and he didn’t like the thought of asking for help from anyone.

 

Now he knew that had been a mistake and a half.

 

He understood now, though, or at least he suspected he did, as he stared out from the balcony, the rain pouring over his bony face. He squinted through the droplets on his glasses and looked up into the night where Dan had pointed out the city to him. Back then, he’d been more interested in the fact he could see Jupiter in the clear sky. He should have listened to Dan, he knew he should have. He should have listened straight away, the day after the incident, and made it easier for the both of them, but he didn’t, and that was just a mistake he had to live with now.

 

Maybe he was OK with it.

 

Maybe he’d learned something.

 

He was getting better now anyway. Sure, he still looked a bit rough around the edges and nobody would be surprised to see him loitering around the bins behind a shady takeaway, and his hip-bones stuck out like a sore thumb. But he smiled now and he had fun, and he really felt like Dan was his friend again. Almost a decade of friendship would always ensure their bond wasn’t going to be broken by anything so small any time soon.

 

It was only now he realised how he should have spoken. How Dan had always been there. Ready to listen, to help, to do anything. But Phil hadn’t wanted to speak, to ask for help, to sit and talk about it. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do. He had felt like he was drifting, like the hours passed like minutes and the days like hours.

 

He filled his days making himself useful at the local TESCO, and his free time tracing circles on his desk and feeling sorry for himself. He didn’t only feel lost, he felt stupid. Maybe that’s why he was hiding, why he didn’t want to talk about it; it was such a small, silly, inconsequential thing that took place and he shouldn’t have let it effect him like this. It was infantile, that’s what he told himself. It was only when he got to grips with the fact that the mistake was serious to his health that he finally picked up the subject again. That and seeing the concern on people’s faces.

 

He’d never liked to disappoint, but it occurred to him that by locking himself away, he was disappointing people more than if he would just go out there and put on a show.

 

He couldn’t imagine how it had been for Dan. He almost didn’t want to, but he knew that he had to be understanding and put himself in someone else’s shoes sometimes. He’d made life a drag for his housemate and he was feeling very sorry about it.

 

 _“Hey,”_ came Dan’s voice from behind him, "...What are you doing out here? It’s soaking.”

 

Phil gave a quiet scoff, staring down from the railings down the building to the concrete far below. He tapped the empty shandy bottle against the rail to the tune of whatever unidentifiable song was in his head at the time and smiled, softly.

 

“Just thinking."

 

“What are you thinking about?” Dan asked.

 

“Just… nothing. I'm sorry, that’s all."

 

“What for?"

 

“Well, for brushing you off before. For ignoring your help. For making everything a big deal in the first place. I-.. I’m sorry I caused such a mess. I’m sorry for shouting at you sometimes, I’m sorry for that time you told me you were scared of me and I told you to grow up,” Phil admitted, guiltily, “You’ve been a massive help, and I wouldn’t be here, on this balcony, having gone through everything we've gone through... if it wasn’t for you. So thank you."

 

There was a long silence, but somehow it wasn’t awkward.

 

Phil heard Dan sniffle a bit, probably wiping away a tear or two, and let out a short laugh. Then he felt arms wrap tightly around him, enveloping him in a sort of warmth he never felt from anybody else.

 

Dan had always been there. Supporting. Attentive. Why had he been ignored so much? That was what Phil felt worst about.

 

“Yeah, I forgive you,” Dan whispered to him, his voice the only sound apart from the muffled noise of the darkened city, “Of course I forgive you. You’ve done a lot for me, too. What would I be doing now if I never met you?… Hey, don’t… don’t do that...” he snickered, roughly wiping a tear off Phil’s cheek.

 

Phil gave a ginger laugh, sighing and tilting his head to the side as he looked up to the stars. Up to Jupiter. He thought it was weird how it was the same moon up there that he’d looked at on tour, on hiatus, the years before that and even back when he was just starting out. Young, rosy-cheeked... It didn’t feel like him – that old Phil felt like a completely different character, someone who didn’t have a worry in the world.

 

Maybe he didn’t understand it all perfectly: why Dan would still care for him even through all his snapping and yelling and crying and stubbornness. But maybe he didn't have to know.

 

Maybe that’s what best friends just do.


End file.
